Reflection about Global Warming and Energy Safety

While we urge to control Global Warming looking at different types of renewable energy alternative food, alternative material to plastics we seem to be losing track of the giant low handing fruits out there, just in front of us, which must be addressed by their chiefs of state urgently if we really want to make an impact on CO2 emissions.

Out of the 10+ GT emissions from China (2019) a country which emits as much as the Europe and US combined 2nd and 3rd countries on the emission ranking, 70% of those emissions or about 7+ GT are emitted from coal primarily to power it`s industrial conglomerate. It is well known that the most efficient gas turbines in the world can generate the same electricity as a coal plant with a 70% gain in efficiency, which means you technically can produce the same energy with a substantially lower carbon emission.

Should China alone modernize their electricity generation to 100% gas, we`d make a dent of about 5 GT on the global emissions which would be equivalent to transform 100% of US or Europe into a zero emission zone. India and US the second and third largest coal consuming countries, 23% and 14% of China`s consumption respectively, could deliver another 1.8GT reduction which would be equivalent to bring Russia 5th on the emission rank to zero emissions.

Should that be implemented we`d be making a 18.4% dent on CO2 emissions globally, which is already higher than electrifying 100% of the transportation globally.

Another aspect we need to consider is how to ensure we have a more balanced energy grid on countries like India where only 35% of its giant population (1.4 billion) lives in urban area. Should India or other countries at low urban rates, follow China`s steps and bring another 25% of its population to urban area in the next 25 years without going for a more balanced energy mix along the way, there`s nothing the rest of the world will be able to do to compensate for the increased carbon emission coming from this movement. Please look at China CO2 emission from 1990 to 2019 for comparison. 10 Charts to Explain Global Emissions — The Global Current.

Cars or transportation electrification without grid modernization will not be enough to meet the planet`s CO2 emission reduction requirement. The maximum reduction that cold be achieved considering 100% electrification, would be a timid 16% reduction in emissions and it may make the situation even worse. Assuming a surge in demand for electricity at the generation side, which already represents a larger chunk of the CO2 emissions 27%, if the generation in China`s which is heavily coal based don`t switch, into gas, hydro, solar or wind the net effect could be worse than the current emissions.

A fast paced transport electrification and adoption without grid modernization would create spikes in demand for electricity when people come back home from work, or go to work and park at company parking lots, those peaks of energy demand may create a bigger problem which is energy safety. Situations such as what has recently been observed in California during the summer time driven by excessive AC usage and in Texas now with the freezing cold winter due to spike in electrical heating demand. Imagine how critical it could get should US have a higher rate of electrical cars, trains and trucks being used to move people, goods and supplies on extreme temperatures.

It`s past time for legislators, chiefs of state and global business leaders to broaden the discussion about energy transition around how to keep the right mix of energy into the grid, how to integrate and modernize the different power grids across different geographies, states and countries so that demand and supply can be balanced during the peaks.

And we can safely transition into more energy efficient systems without putting millions of people's life at risk during our ever increasing temperature peaks which to a certain extent are caused by the overall global warming. We must not rush into a solution for climate change but carefully plan and risk access this transition to make sure we prioritize and focus on the highest impact areas, rather than trying to attack the problem from every front at the same time in a non-coordinated and risky effort.

Or make passionate unreasonable and at times naive requests to stop fossil fuels immediately, such requests are dangerous and may cause more harm than help our cause to survive those record high temperatures which may suddenly drop to record lows should we have a simple massive volcanic eruption such as the ones that caused mini-ice ages in the 13th and 15th centuries. It`s not because the world is getting hot that we shouldn`t be ready in case it suddenly gets cold. History proves that it may also happen, and we tend to think only about what happened 1 or 2 generations before us, and end up forgetting that several black swan events happened throughout humanity history.

References used as source of information:

10 Charts to Explain Global Emissions — The Global Current

• Leading countries in coal consumption globally 2019 | Statista

China: CO2 Country Profile - Our World in Data

World Population Clock: 7.8 Billion People (2021) - Worldometer (worldometers.info)

Little Ice Age volcanism - Wikipedia