> With a bit of social pressure we should be able to extinct the fossil fuel industry
Taking Europe versus China, California versus Texas, it seems like social pressure is less effective than markets. Let markets build the power source they want to build and lo and behold you get lots of solar and wind and batteries.
That’s true today, it wasn’t true when Germany was heavily subsidizing solar to get economies of scale going.
Solar is historically a great example where public / private collaboration actually had a place. Even if today it’s time to let market forces work.
Solar is just one technology. Decarbonizing successfully requires still further huge investments in batteries, modular nuclear reactors, CO2 removal, zero-carbon steel production, aviation e-fuels, non-fossil plastics, etc. But yes, hopefully we've unlocked enough economic advantage with just that one technology to get us 90% of the way there just on the basis of economics. (If the current administration doesn't find some way to sabotage it.)
It's just a shame that they didn't end up enjoying the spoils very long. They had very good panels that were researched and produced in Germany but they got completely wiped out by cheap Chinese products
It's a cute ideal, but you can't disentangle government from the energy sector. It's too big.
How do markets build infrastructure as large as an LNG terminal without the government tipping the scales with various guarantees? How do you build a literal coastline of refineries without government clearing the way with permissive regulations? How can you say "let markets figure it out" when the US military is the acquisition department of Halliburton's Iraqi joint venture?
Pretending "markets can figure it out if we just remove government subsidies" is hopelessly naiive. Geopolitics is mostly energy policy.
> you can't disentangle government from the energy sector
Nobody argued as much. My point is the net effect of social pressure on the energy transformation has been costly—financially and politically—for relatively little bang.
Because the opponents of it have the deepest pockets of literally anybody in the world.
A whole class of parasites who have made their lives as highwaymen on the densest energy source (outside of uranium) -- that literally comes out of the ground -- have spent at least the last 20 years actively suppressing alternatives.
In some places (see Alberta, Canada), they have literally outlawed renewable developments.
In this context political advocacy, education, and subsidy remain absolutely imperative.
There is no "free market" way out of the current situation regardless of how economically viable solar is. In the real world markets and power are intrinsically linked.
It's also actually also an emergency
> Because the opponents of it have the deepest pockets of literally anybody in the world
Yet somehow these opponents have been ham fisted when it comes to opposing the projects which make commercial sense?
> In this context political advocacy, education, and subsidy remain absolutely imperative
Agree. But the bans were counterproductive.
> There is no "free market"
You're the only one in this thread who's brought up free markets.
> It's also actually also an emergency
In a sense. I'd underscore, again, that the breathless activism did approximately nothing–the actual gains came from China pursuing national-security interests and market forces driving the deployment and development of solar, wind and batteries.
We are at the tail end of 30+ years of successful social awareness efforts, and government regulation and incentivization.
Social awareness and pressure produced the government action necessary to incubate the early markets and seed research. It helped to spur the armies of young researches set about improving solar generation, wind generation, power storage, electric motors, and even LEDs.
Yeah, it's "obvious" now the economics make sense for producers to build wind and solar farms. Or yeah, purchasing LEDs is a no-brainer now why on earth would anyone want to incandescent bulbs; that's boomer tech.
I operate incandescent bulbs because I consider them healthier than LED bulbs, especially the incandescents with neodymium glass that transmits UV light.
(Unlike my LED bulbs though, I will turn an incandescent off every time I step away from it.)
Wait, which part is China and which is Europe? Solar didn't win in China because of social pressure, but also not because of market forces. It did win because the CCP made energy independence a political goal.
If we let the markets have their way, Earth becomes unhabitable. Coal and oil plants aren't being shut down. In fact, we have more than ever with additional ones on the way.
It's because "free market" is and always has been a misnomer. Free to ignore externalities, yes. But our shared ecosystem is not seen as a market participant, so it can't charge the true cost of burning hydrocarbons.
We'd also still have industry dumping raw waste directly into our waterways. I'm not so sure that this wouldn't have killed more people faster than unregulated coal/oil plants.