A slow transition
Time needed to cut fossil-fuel use
Some people are strong advocates for renewable energy (particularly wind and solar) and promote the rapid phasing out of fossil-fuel energy use, even its immediate cessation. An editorial in the Oct. 7 issue of the Democrat Gazette (“Best of Both Worlds”) pointed out that the recently passed Inflation Reduction Act required a minimum number of new fossil-fuel drilling leases to be offered, in addition to supporting construction of new renewable energy.
The editorial may leave the impression that this fossil-fuel requirement was just politics. But there is another very critical reason.
The world’s population (about 8 billion) uses an almost incomprehensible amount of generated energy, and about 80 percent of that derives from fossil fuels. Producing and utilizing that fossil-fuel energy involves technology and infrastructure developed over more than a century.
Imagine a world without any produced energy used for electricity, transportation, home heating, or factory operations. Without that energy, essentially all modern aspects of life would stop. Ceasing the generation of that fossil-fuel energy before replacement energy from renewable sources becomes available is unthinkable.
Renewable energy advocates (including the United Nations) have promoted the year 2050 as the time when all energy derived from fossil fuels should cease. Some advocate a faster response. Further, electricity is promoted as the predominant future energy type.
How difficult would it be to replace all fossil-fuel energy with energy that produces no greenhouse gases (wind, solar, or nuclear)? We can visualize the challenge by calculating how many new wind towers would have to be erected or how many new nuclear plants would need to be constructed between now and the year 2050 to achieve this goal. The answer is almost unbelievable.
Each day between now and 2050 (about 9,500 days) 2,000 wind turbines, each producing 3 megawatts, or one nuclear power plant must be brought into operation. Further, because the U.S. uses about 17 percent of world energy, the U.S. alone would have to install 17 percent of the needed energy-generators. (For the technically inclined, daily world energy use amounts to about 50 million-billion joules, or 47 trillion BTUs, or 14 terawatt hours.) For comparison, the U.S. currently has just over 70,000 wind turbines (compared to a required total of about 19 million) and the last two U.S. nuclear power reactors made operational occurred in 2023 and 2016. Further, this analysis does not consider the sizeable cost and vast materials requirement involved.
Clearly, use of fossil fuels for energy will have to continue for years, and its replacement by energy sources that do not produce greenhouse gases will be a slow process. Those future needed fossil fuels must be located and made ready.