It’s Too Late For Renewables

There is no energy transition, no paradigm shift or green revolution. Acknowledging this stark reality sooner rather than later will allow us to focus on devising strategies for managing the consequences of climate change, and the deteriorating state of earth’s biosphere.

This week, energy expert Vaclav Smil provided a valuable perspective.

“Contrary to common impressions, there has been no absolute worldwide decarbonization. In fact, the very opposite is the case. The world has become much more reliant on fossil carbon.

“We have not made the slightest progress…We cannot expect the world economy to become carbon-free by 2050. The goal may be desirable, but it remains unrealistic.

Vaclav Smil

The news, however, is full of outlandish claims that the world can depend mostly on wind and solar power, and that all other energy needs—from airplanes to steel production—can be met by green hydrogen or nuclear fusion. These assertions are more aspirational than real. Steel, concrete, plastic, and fertilizer are essential to modern civilization, yet we currently lack methods to produce them on a large scale without relying on fossil fuels.

Transport continues to rely on oil products for nearly 91% of its final energy, down only 3.5 percentage points from the early 1970s. Despite popular belief that electric vehicles will become the norm in the near future, the International Energy Agency (IEA) expects electricity to provide only 11 percent of global transport power by 2050 in its stated policies scenario. Oil will still account for 78 percent of transport fuel in two-and-a-half decades (Figure 1).

Global fossil fuel consumption increased 45 percent since 2000. Its share of total consumption has decreased marginally with more wind and solar installations but fossil fuels still accounted for 86 percent of primary energy consumption in 2022. While wind and solar capacity have doubled in the last five years, these account for only 2.0 percent of world energy consumption (Figure 2). All renewables together—including solar, wind, nuclear, hydro, and biofuels— make up only 7% of global energy use.

It’s time to be honest about this reality and stop imagining some improbable renewable future that cannot be remotely supported by historical data trends. Despite advanced economies pouring approximately $10 trillion into the “renewable energy transition,” there has been no significant evidence of progress in reducing carbon emissions or lowering global temperatures. Estimated capital costs for the transition to a net-zero economy are approximately $275 trillion between 2021 and 2050. ​ This would require average annual spending on physical assets of around $9.2 trillion, or roughly 20 percent of GDP for advanced economies.

The idea that we’re undergoing an energy transition lacks compelling evidence. Historical data on world energy consumption from 1800 reveals an additive rather than a subtractive pattern (Figure 3). This means that new energy sources are layered on top of old ones, rather than replacing them.

Today, both biomass and coal consumption exceed their 1800 levels, with renewable energy sources like wind and solar barely making a statistical impact. This underlines that, despite the investment in renewables, they are just a small addition to our ongoing conventional energy usage.

It is not surprising, therefore, that the supposed energy transition has not affected the increase in global mean temperature—which is at the highest level in the last 11,000 years (Figure 4).

Nor is it surprising that the ongoing crisis of the natural environment, and the decline of biodiversity has not improved. Populations of mammals, birds, amphibians, reptiles, and fish have declined by an average of 69% since 1970 (Figure 5). Expansion of the human enterprise through deforestation, urbanization, and pollution have led to the destruction and fragmentation of natural habitats, making it difficult for species to survive and thrive.

Despite clear evidence that the world’s efforts to decarbonize are failing, I consistently see papers and presentations that argue the superiority of renewables over fossil fuels.

This week, for example, I came across a video claiming that the transition from fossil fuels to renewables is feasible because much of the energy from fossil fuels ends up as “rejected energy”—essentially wasted. The argument is that renewables, being less wasteful, don’t need to replace as much fossil energy as commonly projected. Yet, while the channel boasts nearly 600,000 subscribers, the optimistic take overlooks the complex realities of energy systems. Merely pointing to inefficiencies in fossil fuel use does not address the scalability and intermittency challenges that renewables face on a grid designed around consistent energy input from fossil fuels.

Another example this week involved a peer-reviewed paper that suggested that wind and solar have a much higher EROI (energy returned on energy invested) than fossil fuels. Such a claim highlights these renewables as more efficient in terms of energy output relative to input when compared to traditional energy sources. However, while the paper makes a compelling case for the efficiency of renewables, the practical aspects of integrating high-EROI renewables into an energy infrastructure that’s heavily dependent on the consistent energy flow from fossil fuels present significant challenges that the paper does not address.

Both examples have their flaws, but ultimately, their specific claims and arguments matter less than the empirical data, which clearly indicates no significant shift away from fossil fuels. The instances I’ve discussed serve merely as enthusiastic endorsements for the renewable sector, offering little in the way of real progress towards decarbonization. Framing the future of our planet as a competition between two factions—Team Renewables vs Team Fossil—trivializes the serious, complex challenge of genuinely reducing carbon emissions.

“Belief in near-miraculous tomorrows never goes away…Responsible analyses must acknowledge existing energy, material, engineering, managerial, economic, and political realities.”

Vaclav Smil

The sustained increase in fossil fuel consumption alongside the growth of human activities presents significant environmental and economic risks. While renewable energy offers some relief by reducing fossil fuel dependency, particularly in electric power generation, its impact remains limited. Even if renewables could fully replace coal in electricity generation—a major source of carbon emissions—they would still address only about 20 percent of global energy consumption. The intermittent nature of renewable sources and the ongoing expansion of coal-fired power generation complicate this transition. The slow pace of change and the continuous rise in overall energy demand suggest that renewables will have only a marginal effect on global emissions within the critical time required for substantial climate action.

The energy transition as currently framed is a bad idea because it does not address the underlying problem of growth in energy consumption. The premise of the transition is to replace fossil fuels with renewables. It fails to acknowledge that climate change is a consequence of the larger problem of overshoot.

“Humanity is in overshoot—global heating, plunging biodiversity, soil/land degradation, tropical deforestation, ocean acidification, fossil fuel and mineral depletion, the pollution of everything, etc., are indicative of the increasing disordering of the biosphere/ecosphere.

“We are at risk of a chaotic breakdown of essential life-support functions.”

William E. Rees

The history of energy transitions shows that no energy source has never before replaced another. If it is happening now, it will be too late to make a difference at the present pace of climate change and ecological collapse. Energy substitution is a doomsday stratagem that condemns civilization to its status quo path of growth & biophysical destruction.

Everyone wants solutions, yet there’s a pervasive lack of understanding about the problem itself. Attempting to solve a problem without understanding it first is an error. In the present case, It could be fatal.