What Is Our Energy Future?

Global energy consumption will double by mid-century, regardless of what the United States does. It’s not from the 1 billion people already using vast amounts of electricity, or the 1 billion using modest amounts of electricity.  It results from the 1.6 billion people that do not have any access to electricity whatsoever, the 2.4 billion that have almost no access to electricity and still burn wood and manure as their main source of energy, and the 3 billion new people that will be born by mid-century who will need electricity.

Since humans need about 3,000 kWhr per person per year just to have what we consider a decent life, this means the world must produce over 30 trillion kWhrs per year just to eradicate global poverty, war and terrorism.

Without a more sustainable and balanced energy mix, the increase in fossil fuels will be appalling and costly, and the environmental effects devastating. To counter this future dystopia, we propose a ⅓-⅓-⅓: a third fossil fuel, a third renewable and a third nuclear (figure below). To achieve this will require heroic efforts and infrastructure construction on a scale this planet has never seen:

a.  Replacement of all existing coal with a combination of combined cycle gas and fluidized bed coal reactors which are somewhat cleaner,

b.  3 trillion kWhrs/year from hydroelectric

c. 1,700 new nuclear reactors to produce electricity totaling 10 trillion kWhrs/year from GenIII and GenIV designs including small modulars (China, alone, is planning about 400 new reactors)

d.  Over two million 3+ MW wind turbines or equivalent totaling 3 trillion kWhrs/year

e.  Concentrated, ordinary and distributed solar arrays totaling 3 trillion kWhrs/year

f.  100 bbl/yr of biofuels from algae, cellulosics and high-efficiency biomass, not ethanol

g.  Over a trillion kWhrs/year from other alternatives such as wave, tidal and biogas.

The cost to implement and operate this mix will be about $65 trillion over 50 years, about $30 trillion of that in construction alone. (A business-as-usual mix of two-thirds fossil fuel would cost about the same to provide 30 trillion kWhrs/yr, with slightly less capital costs but more fuel and O&M costs.)  About 2% of global GDP will be needed annually to provide for either of these futures. Financing this level of investment will be the real challenge. This ⅓-⅓-⅓ mix would result in:

–     a more diverse, stable and secure energy supply for over 1,000 years for 10 billion people

–     a 50% reduction in global CO₂ emissions over the present mix, and

–     a leveling of worldwide fossil fuel use at about 2006 levels.

Others have appealed for similarly ambitious goals:

–     the President’s call for an 80% reduction in U.S. CO₂ emissions by mid-century,

–     the push by the American Council on Renewable Energy for 50% renewables for the U.S. by 2050, or

–     the European Union goal of 50% alternatives by 2040.

Proposed ⅓-⅓-⅓ target global energy mix: a third fossil fuel, a third renewable and a third nuclear. Note that the absolute magnitude of fossil fuel use does not decrease much as the total pie doubles from 15 trillion kWhrs/year to 30 trillion kWhrs/year. The increase must be covered by alternatives.

If we do not aggressively change direction by 2020, it will be too late and we will be taken, by default, down the fossil fuel path. Sure, we have lots and lots of fossil fuel, enough to cover our needs for the next 500 years.  Or do we?  We geologists know that the concept of peak oil and peak gas referred only to conventional fossil fuel with standard methods of extraction.  Peak is now irrelevant in the face of huge reservoirs of the so-called “unconventionals”, i.e., tar sands, gas shales and heavy oils, with the concomitant new methods of extraction to recover them including dangerous solvent injection and hydrofracking. We cannot ignore the horrendous environmental and health costs of a fossil fuel-dominated future because these costs are real and someone has to pay them. These very dirty “unconventionals” will not peak until far into the future, well past the next major global demographic and environmental tipping points that will alter our future beyond recognition.  We must resist the temptation that they will solve all our problems.

Forbes