We Have the Renewable Energy We Need to Power the World—So What's Stopping Us?

[hunter]

31. One quits smoking by quitting smoking. One quits fossil fuels by quitting fossil fuels.

Anyone here can quit fossil fuel and nuclear electricity. Get off your butt, walk out to the main breaker of your place of residence, and flip it off. Done!

Anyone can quit burning gasoline in their automobile. Disassemble your automobile. Turn it into arts and crafts. Use the windows for greenhouses, the body panels for roofing materials, the seats for furniture. Attach the alternator to a stationary bicycle and generate your own electricity, get plenty of exercise too!

Anyone can quit being a "consumer." Quit buying stuff! Those huge diesel engine container ships will stop crossing oceans.

My point is that a world powered by "renewable" energy is a very different place then the world most people reading this live in. Renewables are not an "alternative" to fossil fuels or nuclear power, they are not a drop-in replacement. A civilization without fossil fuels or nuclear power would look very different than the civilization we live in now.

A world powered by renewable energy is slow paced world without personal automobiles, airlines or any other high speed transportation. People walk to work. They walk to the grocery store. It's a world without big box stores, fast food places, superhighways, or low-density suburbs. It's a world largely without central air conditioning and heating.

The only way we can maintain our current sort of civilization without fossil fuels is nuclear power. You end up with something that looks a lot like a future France might. More high speed rail and much less airline traffic. Fewer automobiles, but all electric.

Without nuclear power the optimal sustainable lifestyle is much simpler. There's room for high technology in this world, it's not impossible to keep cell phones, personal computers, and a worldwide communication system operating on renewable energy alone. It's not impossible to provide electric wheels or legs for the disabled. But in a world powered by renewable energy sources most of us are going to be getting around town on the power of our own legs.

As the energy math works now renewable sources of energy ARE NOT replacing fossil fuels or nuclear power, they simply allow those fossil fuels or nuclear power to be diverted elsewhere. As we burn less coal here in the U.S.A. (using fracked gas instead, a really dirty fuel...) our coal companies begin itching to export coal to Asia. As we import less oil from overseas, Canada is happy to sell us tar sand oil (a really, really, dirty fuel.) When Germany turned off its nuclear plants they build more coal fired plants, in spite of their installed solar and wind capacity.

I'm an advocate of a slow-paced high technology civilization. Few things in this civilization would travel much faster than a fast human can run. Most commerce would be local. World travel would be accomplished by robust, very advanced sailing ships. Rapid high-energy transport would be reserved for emergencies.

There are many sorts of "renewable" energy that are just as loathsome as fossil fuels. Tidal power and giant hydro-electric schemes are some. Huge solar power plants on undeveloped deserts are another. Chipping down and shredding forests for fuel is a wretched idea too. Every last square inch of remaining wilderness should remain wild and our civilization needs to pull back and restore much of the wilderness we have destroyed.

I'm not optimistic humans can accomplish any kind of sustainable civilization. We haven't yet. Every major civilization has fallen. If we can't accomplish it eventually Nature will remove us from the playing field entirely and a million or so years in the future little will remain of us but a confusing layer of trash in the geologic record and a few peculiar outer space artifacts.