{"id":380706,"date":"2025-05-29T18:57:58","date_gmt":"2025-05-29T16:57:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=380706"},"modified":"2025-05-29T18:58:00","modified_gmt":"2025-05-29T16:58:00","slug":"shifting-from-energy-scarcity-to-energy-abundance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=380706","title":{"rendered":"Shifting from Energy Scarcity to Energy\u00a0Abundance"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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From Science Matters<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

By\u00a0Ron Clutz<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n

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Prior to the Paris COP in 2015, French scientists debunked the green agenda in a White Paper drawn up by the Soci\u00e9t\u00e9 de Calcul Math\u00e9matique SA  (Mathematical Modelling Company, Corp.)  <\/strong>The battle against global warming: an absurd, costly and pointless crusade<\/a><\/strong>.  The whole document is evidence-based, and on the second point concerning energy, they said this:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Chapter 2: The crusade is costly<\/em><\/strong>
Direct aid for industries that are completely unviable<\/strong> (such as photovoltaics and wind turbines) but presented as \u2018virtuous\u2019 runs into billions of euros, according to recent reports published by the Cour des Comptes (French Audit Office) in 2013. But the highest cost lies in the principle of \u2018energy saving,\u2019 which is presented as especially virtuous. Since no civilization can develop when it is saving energy,<\/strong> ours has stopped developing: France now has more than three million people unemployed \u2014 it is the price we have to pay for our virtue\u2026.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Finally, the world seems to be waking up to energy realities. The actual transition is away from the green imperative to make energy scarce, replaced by driving energy abundance. Kevin Killough writes, including commentary from Mark Mills of Energy Analystics, in his Just The News article:  World moves away from \u2018green gospel of scarcity\u2019 and now embraces \u2018energy abundance,\u2019 experts say<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI think we\u2019ve gone from scarcity to abundance \u2014 from the green gospel of scarcity and its Trinitarian ESG god \u2014 to the promised land of abundance<\/strong> guided by the values of affordability and reliability,\u201d David DesRosiers, conference co-chair of the RealClear Energy Future Forum, said.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n

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In 2019, Swedish climate activist\u00a0Greta Thunberg<\/strong>\u00a0\u2014 then a high-school dropout \u2014 was invited to the U.N. Climate Action Summit in New York City. There, she would deliver her famous \u2014 or infamous, depending on who you ask \u2014\u00a0\u201chow dare you<\/a>\u201d speech, t<\/strong>o which legacy media responded with\u00a0overwhelming enthusiasm<\/a>. Thunberg\u00a0claimed<\/strong>\u00a0that we were at the\u00a0start of a \u201cmass extinction,<\/strong>\u201d and she admonished the world for ignoring the alleged crisis while talking \u201cabout money and fairy tales of eternal economic growth.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n

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What a difference six years can make.<\/strong>\u00a0Voters elected a president in November who signed an executive order aimed at \u201cunleashing American energy<\/a>,\u201d and Energy Secretary Chris Wright followed the president\u2019s order\u00a0with a directive to promote<\/a>\u00a0\u201cenergy abundance.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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This U-turn in views on energy isn\u2019t limited to a change in administration in the U.S<\/strong>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In May 2021, the International Energy Agency (IEA),<\/strong> which has been criticized for cheerleading emissions reductions<\/a>, launched a roadmap to reach net zero by 2050<\/a>, and IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol told The Guardian<\/a> that \u201cthere will not be a need for new investments in oil and gas fields, or new investments in coal mines.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the March CERAWeek energy conference in Houston this year, Birol was calling for more investments in oil and gas<\/a>.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This shift away from the de-growth fervor<\/strong> that was popular for over a decade was the overriding topic at the RealClear Energy Future Forum<\/a> Monday. Panels of experts in engineering, data centers, mining, oil and gas, and the electricity grid discussed how this change of views has impacted various aspects of the world\u2019s energy picture.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI think we\u2019ve gone from scarcity to abundance \u2014 from the green gospel of scarcity and its Trinitarian ESG god \u2014 to the promised land of abundance guided by the values of affordability and reliability,\u201d David DesRosiers, conference co-chair and founder of the RealClear Foundation<\/a>, said.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n

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When reality hits<\/strong><\/em><\/h5>\n\n\n\n

Mark Mills, conference co-chair and director of the National Center for Energy Analytics<\/a>, discussed the role of increasing energy demand<\/strong> as a result of the growth of data centers and artificial intelligence.<\/strong> While many tech companies, such as Microsoft,<\/a> embraced net-zero goals, Mills explained that the energy demands of data centers forced companies to contend with the reality that although fashionable in some circles, intermittent wind and solar power are not adequate.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cEventually, reality rears its ugly head, and we recalibrate around what reality permits<\/strong>,\u201d Mills said.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The IEA last month released an in-depth report<\/a> on how the demand for electricity will be shaped by AI in the coming years. According to the report, a single data center uses as much electricity as 2 million households.<\/strong> Powering one of these data centers, Mills said, requires as much natural gas every day as a single Space X rocket launch<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWith myriads of data centers planned and announced,<\/strong> this means that lighting up the digital infrastructure will soon have the energy demands equivalent to reliably powering hundreds of millions of households,\u201d Mills said.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n

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Mills said, besides the energy to power these data centers, they will also require an abundance of materials.<\/strong> A skyscraper<\/strong> requires the same amount of materials<\/strong> to build a single giga-scale data center,<\/strong> which is a data center requiring 1 billion watt-hours of electricity every hour \u2014 the same amount of power consumed by approximately 1,100 homes in a month.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

While some have argued that increased efficiencies will address the demand, Mills pointed out that a single smartphone operating at the energy efficiency of a 1984 computer would use more electricity than an entire city block. More efficiency won\u2019t reduce demand for energy, he explained, it will only increase how much can be done with more energy.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n

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The way the grid works<\/strong><\/em><\/h5>\n\n\n\n

Energy abundance is not only producing more energy. The supply has to be reliable,<\/strong> the experts at the conference said. A few speakers pointed to the blackouts that gripped Spain and Portugal last month<\/a> as an example<\/strong> of how dangerous an unreliable energy supply can be. Estimates place the death toll<\/a> from the one-day event at seven people.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

James Robb, CEO of the North American Electric Reliability Corporation<\/a>, said that the exact cause of the event is still under investigation, but there are facts that point to the overreliance on intermittent wind and solar.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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At the time of the blackout, Robb said, there was little traditional generation \u2014 coal, natural gas, hydroelectric and nuclear \u2014 operating. To make wind, solar and battery power<\/strong> work on the grid, it has to go through an inverter<\/strong>, which doesn\u2019t have the spinning inertia<\/strong> of generators powered by traditional sources. Grid operators need to maintain a certain frequency of power, and when there\u2019s a disruption, spinning inertia can absorb some of the frequency changes until things stabilize.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Federal Energy Regulatory Commission Chairman Mark Christie explained inertia as a 100-acre lake 6-inches deep<\/strong>. At one end is a river flowing into the lake, like power generated on the grid. At the other end is a river flowing out of the lake, which is the demand for power. To make the grid work, the water has to be kept 6-inches deep at all times.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cIf that lake, at any point, becomes an inch deeper or loses an inch of depth, the lake ceases to operate. That\u2019s the way the grid works. It has to be\u00a0balanced at all times, and that\u2019s the term frequency,<\/strong>\u201d Christie said.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n

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Robb said there are technologies that create synthetic inertia<\/strong> for wind and solar generators, but these are unproven at scale.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThey\u2019re not without their issues there, and one of the big challenges we always have in the electric grid with any new technology is you can study something in the lab. You can deploy\u2026a pilot [project] on a grid somewhere. But when you try to scale it to the level of the North American grid, which is a terawatt of generation, typically in that translation from pilot to terawatt, we discover things that we don\u2019t understand,\u201d<\/strong> Robb said.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Spain and Portugal Achieve Net Zero Accidently<\/a><\/blockquote>