No oil. No natural gas. No coal. No nuclear.
That does not leave much to power your car, our airplanes and your blow dryer. It also raises the question as to how you are going to charge the battery on your electric car or your iPhone.
The energy sources that Green New Deal advocates point to are wind, water, solar and geothermal.
Let's put all of this in perspective with a couple of charts I came across recently.
The first shows the share of various sources of energy consumption since 1860. I thought it was interesting that muscle power still represented one-third of energy consumption as late as 1950.
The reality in the world we live in today is that fossil fuels make up close to 90% of energy consumption. Wind and water are not large enough today to even be discernible in the chart.
The second chart shows the growth of various forms of energy consumption since 1800.
You can again see that the sources of energy that Green New Deal advocates want to literally bet our lives and livelihoods on are infinitesimal today. Considering the time necessary to develop these sources, scale them and create the infrastructure to deploy them, we are decades away from having any realistic hope of utilizing them in a manner sufficient to sustain the world's economy.
Energy makes the world economy go. We need it for anything we want to do. It needs to be available and it needs to be affordable. The economy does not work without energy. The consumer cannot spend on other things in the economy if they are spending excessive amounts on energy. If the consumer doesn't spend, the economy does not grow. If the economy does not grow, more and more people go without jobs.
If you doubt there is a relationship between affordable, available energy and economic growth consider this chart that compares world GDP growth with energy consumption growth. Could there be a better correlation?
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| Credit:Mike Haseler |
This chart was produced by Climate Scientist Mike Haseler who writes a blog named the Scottish Sceptic. Haseler points out that this relationship exists because GDP is the sum total of what humans produce. When muscle power was the prime energy source in the world we could produce very little. Firewood and domesticated animals improved our ability to produce. However, the introduction of energy sources like coal, oil and gas allowed us to greatly leverage our productive capacity. Compare the dramatic increase in GDP beginning around 1950 with the great increase in fossil fuels beginning at the same time in the charts above.
Haseler believes that green economics schemes that are done to "save the planet" will inevitably destroy the economy in the process. The only way to avoid that result is if the cost of the new energy inputs are more affordable than fossil fuels.
Why is that?
Consider there is a product that is produced using 100 units of fossil fuel energy at a cost of $100.
A green initiative mandates that the energy source that produced that 100 units of energy be replaced with one that costs $200.
Nothing additional has been produced but it now costs $100 more. There is now $100 less to be spent on something else in the economy. Overall GDP will decrease as a result.
Haseler also points out that "energy efficiency" schemes do not work because, although we may save energy and money by insulating our houses, that additional money is then spent on other other goods and services that require energy to produce it, transport it and heat the shop we bought it at.
"...when we take it all into account, the increase in energy from that extra spending power matches the energy we thought we had saved. So … just the same amount of energy is used … just in a different place."
I am all for developing newer and better sustainable sources of energy. Count me as someone who would love to see a perpetual motion machine to power everything man needs on the planet.
I have great confidence that given free markets economies and human ingenuity we will find better sources of energy to power our lives. This has been proven time and time again over the course of human history.
However, we have never voluntarily abandoned something that is accessible and affordable for something that is speculative and expensive.
Energy drives the economy.
Ignoring that fact puts everything and everyone at risk on this planet.
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