Comments 3

化石燃料的故弄玄虚

Jul 16, 2018 Lili Fuhr , Hannah McKinnon

柏林—2015年巴黎气候协定签署后，许多决策者听信了石油和天然气行业关于如何帮助降低温室气体排放的说辞。关于“清洁煤炭”、“石油管道为清洁能源融资”、“作为过桥能源的天然气”等天方夜谭式的说辞诱使各国政府纷纷上马新化石燃料项目，即便当前化石燃料产量已经难以阻止气温远超巴黎气候协定的限制，即前工业化水平以上2℃以内。

国际能源署（IEA）估算，在2016年，石油和天然气行业投资总量为6,490亿美元，G-20国家化石燃料补贴总量为720亿美元。到2030年，G-20国家新石油天然气项目投资预计将超过1.6万亿美元。

显然，在世界转向去碳化的经济之前，该行业拼命地扩大了产量和利润。而到目前为止，它取得了成功，因为它让政府相信了许多谎言。

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Lili Fuhr

Writing for PS since 2014
10 Commentaries

Lili Fuhr heads the International Environmental Policy Division at the Heinrich Böll Foundation.

Hannah McKinnon

1 Commentary

Hannah McKinnon is Director of Energy Futures and Transitions Program at Oil Change International.

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nigel southway Jul 16, 2018

The problem with this kind of writer is they raise alarms and ask for action but do nothing in terms of solutions.

The only viable energy output source that can be large scaled up and managed to deliver clean energy is nuclear energy… of course these people would perish that thought. …. yet statically it IS the safest when you factor in total global health concerns.
The other elephant in the room is out of control world population… whatever we do we cannot support an energy footprint at 10 Billion people who will all eventually want the western lifestyle. We are already past the sustainability line for the planet on population size.

So, the 3 fixes… control population certainly in those undeveloped communities where babies are born into poverty anyway. And go nuclear as fast as possible, and of course do what makes sense on energy wastage.
- nigel southway Jul 17, 2018
  
  Wow. Nice response…. I am sure we would have a great debate face to face.
  Here is my response to yours……
  
  By halting our quest for safe nuclear power we are missing a huge opportunity as it offers the best energy per person/footprint and the most sustainable and cleanest approach as it uses the least materials to install and run and can plug into existing energy distribution architecture. Anything else will be far less sustainable and attract far more materials which are a source of further not less pollution…. All I am suggesting is it has been dismissed unfairly in many countries by crank advocates not knowledgeable engineers… put another way early ships sank bridges fell and planes crashed, but it did not stop us perfecting those technologies and applications…. Let’s do that with this renewable energy boon of nuclear technology.
  
  I stand by my take on the writers…. I too am an advocate in a much different area but we show solutions that will work.
  
  On the population… you did it. you deflected. just face it…we are too many for any technology. plus, its putting a burden on our social norms and borders.
  
  I agree 100% with your very good rant on the economic system… right on. it’s not sustainable and needs a rethink including our obsession with global trade and the pollution it brings with it… as I said each nation should trade less and make what it consumes more and make products much more sustainable than just feeding a growth and throw away and remake mentality to satisfy the corporate machine.
  
  I question if we do have any renewable technology outside of nuclear to feed our lifestyle even after we green it up.
  
  My main point ……we are not focused on the correct 3 things I mentioned ….and many are heading in the wrong direction. …. but alas…. that’s the human race for you…
  
  From a7
  
  The claim that nuclear energy is statistically the safest energy should be supported with a respective reliable source. It is difficult to see, from the outset, how nuclear energy could be safer, in any conceivable respect, than, say, solar thermal installations or PV Panels. As for the two authors of the article: they are working for the changes they envision. Lily Fuhr is director of the Ecology and Sustainable Development section of the German Heinrich Böll Foundation and Hannah McKinnon heads the energy futures and transition program at Oil Change International. Accusing them of talking the talk but not walking the walk is simply wrong. I - partly - agree about the population elephant, although the main culprit is not really the number of people but per capita energy and resource consumption. I'd say the main elephant in the room is the unquestioned quasi religious belief in an economic system that has long been scientifically proven to be flawed to its very roots. In Germany for example, one of the world leaders in expanding renewable energy capacities, CO2 emissions have at best flattened out at a high level, because "economic growth" leads to ever increasing energy demand, despite ever increasing energy efficiency across all sectors. Ultimately the completely nonsensical concept of forced economic growth with all its diseased incentives will do us in, and nuclear energy surely is not the answer to the problem, also because it definitely is not all that economical (see, for example "The Economics of Nuclear Power" by Steve Thomas:. Nuclear power is only economically interesting for investors when they are given huge subsidies and sweeping guarantees and exemptions (Liability insurance anyone?), in other words: the entire technology is a huge transfer mechanism shoveling public money into the pockets of private investors, of privatizing profit and socializing economic and physical risk. In his book ""Powering the Future", Physics Nobel laureate Robert B. Laughlin, who is a strong advocate of a Thorium Economy, casually says that we should accept that in the future we will loose a major city every decade or so due to nuclear accidents. So no, thank you, we should invest our ingenuity and resources in more clever solutions. Other than what you claim it is absolutely possible to power the world entirely with renewable energy. As an overview I suggest to read the 98 page 2017 REN21 "Renewables Global Future Report - Great Debates Towards 100% Renewable Energy." There are no technological barriers to that goal - the barriers are political, largely driven by the vested economic interests of the world's richest and most powerful industries. Their interests surely are not the same as those of the general population.
  A new reply to this comment has been posted.
- Stefan Thiesen Jul 17, 2018
  
  The claim that nuclear energy is statistically the safest energy should be supported with a respective reliable source. It is difficult to see, from the outset, how nuclear energy could be safer, in any conceivable respect, than, say, solar thermal installations or PV Panels.
  
  As for the two authors of the article: they are working for the changes they envision. Lily Fuhr is director of the Ecology and Sustainable Development section of the German Heinrich Böll Foundation and Hannah McKinnon heads the energy futures and transition program at Oil Change International. Accusing them of talking the talk but not walking the walk is simply wrong.
  
  I - partly - agree about the population elephant, although the main culprit is not really the number of people but per capita energy and resource consumption. I'd say the main elephant in the room is the unquestioned quasi religious belief in an economic system that has long been scientifically proven to be flawed to its very roots. In Germany for example, one of the world leaders in expanding renewable energy capacities, CO2 emissions have at best flattened out at a high level, because "economic growth" leads to ever increasing energy demand, despite ever increasing energy efficiency across all sectors. Ultimately the completely nonsensical concept of forced economic growth with all its diseased incentives will do us in, and nuclear energy surely is not the answer to the problem, also because it definitely is not all that economical (see, for example "The Economics of Nuclear Power" by Steve Thomas: https://www.boell.de/sites/default/files/assets/boell.de/images/download_de/ecology/NIP5ThomasEndf.pdf). Nuclear power is only economically interesting for investors when they are given huge subsidies and sweeping guarantees and exemptions (Liability insurance anyone?), in other words: the entire technology is a huge transfer mechanism shoveling public money into the pockets of private investors, of privatizing profit and socializing economic and physical risk. In his book ""Powering the Future", Physics Nobel laureate Robert B. Laughlin, who is a strong advocate of a Thorium Economy, casually says that we should accept that in the future we will loose a major city every decade or so due to nuclear accidents. So no, thank you, we should invest our ingenuity and resources in more clever solutions. Other than what you claim it is absolutely possible to power the world entirely with renewable energy. As an overview I suggest to read the 98 page 2017 REN21 "Renewables Global Future Report - Great Debates Towards 100% Renewable Energy." There are no technological barriers to that goal - the barriers are political, largely driven by the vested economic interests of the world's richest and most powerful industries. Their interests surely are not the same as those of the general population. http://www.ren21.net/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/16-8325-GFR-Full-Report-2017_X1.pdf
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化石燃料的故弄玄虚

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