How Global Fossil Fuel Dependence Hasn`t Changed In 20 Years.
Whilst enjoying the good natured exchanges on this blog concerning the pros and cons of new renewable energy sources I decided to dig deeper into the success of Green energy policies to date. Roger Andrews produced this chart the other day and the low carbon energy trends caught my eye. It is important to recall that well over $1,700,000,000,000 ($1.7 trillion) has been spent on installing wind and solar devices in recent years with the sole objective of reducing global CO2 emissions. It transpires that since 1995 low carbon energy sources (nuclear, hydro and other renewables) share of global energy consumption has not changed at all (Figure 1). New renewables have not even replaced lost nuclear generating capacity since 1999 (Figure 2). ZERO CO2 has been abated and the world has done zilch to prepare itself for the expected declines (escalating costs) of fossil fuels in the decades ahead. If this is not total policy failure, what is?
Figure 1 Nuclear, Hydro and Other Renewables (mainly wind and solar) expressed as % of total global energy consumption. The combined low carbon share reached 13.1% in 1995. In 2013 it was 13.3%. From this chart it is easy to see that Other Renewables have simply compensated for the decline in nuclear power a point made clearer in Figure 2.
One of the main problems with Green thinking is that many Greens are against both fossil fuel (FF) based energy and nuclear power. There are some notable exceptions, James Lovelock and George Monbiot, and I recognise that a number of the “pro-renewable” commenters on this blog are at least not anti-nuclear. It would also be unfair to blame the relative decline of nuclear power since 2001 exclusively on Greens but they do have to shoulder a significant slice of that responsibility.
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