Fossil fuels work great, except for that one thing, the one where they might cause the extinction of our species. Peter Thiel and others agitate for nukes as a replacement, but clearly renewables would be a far safer alternative if they could be produced on a massive scale. Even if renewables are just a significant piece of the solution for the foreseeable future, they need to reach their tipping point soon. Will the Paris summit be that moment? One attendee, Prof. John Schellnhuber, tells Damian Carrington of the Guardian that an “induced implosion” of the fossil fuel industry must happen now, explaining how it can be provoked. An excerpt:
If a critical mass of big countries implement their pledges, he said in an interview with the Guardian, the move towards a global low-carbon economy would gain unstoppable momentum.
“If some countries really honour their pledges, including China, Brazil, South Africa, US and Europe, I think we will get a dynamic that will transform the development of the century. This is not sheer optimism – it is based on analysis of how incumbent systems implode.”
In July, Schellnhuber told a science conference in Paris that the world needed “an induced implosion of the carbon economy over the next 20-30 years. Otherwise we have no chance of avoiding dangerous, perhaps disastrous, climate change.”
“The avalanche will start because ultimately nothing can compete with renewables,” he told the Guardian. “If you invest at [large] scale, inevitably we will end up with much cheaper, much more reliable, much safer technologies in the energy system: wind, solar, biomass, tidal, hydropower. It is really a no-brainer, if you take away all the ideological debris and lobbying.”
India, for example, aims to deliver 350GW of renewable energy in the next 10 years, the equivalent to 300 nuclear power stations, he said. “That is mind boggling and would be the final nail in the coffin of coal-fired power stations,” Schellnhuber said. “If India delivers on that pledge, it will be a tipping point for that country.”•