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Topic: Capitalism

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[Episode #184] – EROI of RE

Oct 26 2022

Mini Episode

Do renewable energy sources generate enough energy ‘profit’ to make them worth continued investment? And is any energy profit large enough to run our modern world, as renewables displace fossil fuels?

Some skeptics of the energy transition have claimed that renewables can’t run our world because the net energy they deliver to society is too low. They make this argument drawing from past data for the Energy Returned on Investment (or EROI) for various fuels, which showed high EROIs for extracting fossil fuels, and low EROIs for very early generations of wind and solar technology. However, the historical EROI literature has been plagued with methodological inconsistencies so how reliable is this legacy data for guiding modern outlooks?

In a new paper we discuss in today’s episode, a group of researchers has cleaned up and rectified recent EROI data so that the various fuels can be compared on an apples-to-apples basis. Their new results paint a very different picture from the old literature.

Not only do renewables have sufficiently high EROIs to power our society, they are much higher than the EROIs of the fossil fuels they are replacing! In fact, these results suggest that only through the energy transition can we maintain a functioning society.

To walk us through this new paper, its lead researcher, Dr. David Murphy, an environmental scientist at St. Lawrence University in New York, returns to the show.

In addition to reviewing the results of this new paper, we’ll also talk about some of the other mistaken arguments that are frequently made against the energy transition, and explain why they are wrong.

Geek rating: 9

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[Episode #181] – Command Capitalism

Sep 14 2022

Mini Episode

2022 has brought an unprecedented series of energy market interventions as leaders try to stave off domestic unrest in the face of numerous energy supply shocks. Some of the tumult we’ve seen in energy markets this year can be pinned on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and subsequent reactions by the West. But the war in Ukraine and associated sanctions really only exacerbated numerous fundamental trends that were already well established - trends that were positioning governments to take a stronger hand in their energy affairs. We are experiencing some very fundamental supply and demand problems in all sorts of energy fuels and other commodities around the world, and governments have little choice but to intervene wherever they can to maintain stability.

Where is this all taking us? Can capitalism survive the energy transition? Or are we headed into a new era?

Our guest in today’s episode has an answer: Kevin Book of ClearView Energy Partners believes we are seeing a new approach to economic management that he calls “command capitalism.” It may help us manage some of the challenges of the global energy crunch and the energy transition in a more direct way than we could through “free market” means… but it could also wrest control of our destinies away from regulators and energy ministries, with uncertain consequences.

Geek rating: 9

(more…)