ed bourne

I've been working on a video about net zero -- what is it, how will we get there, how far are we along the way, etc. Just finished recording. Research has been extremely depressing. In an nutshell, every serious source (incl the IPCC) agrees that there's no way we'll reach net zero without substantial and fast investment into extensive carbon removal. We're talking about an increase by at least a factor 100 (!) by 2050. Yet this carbon removal doesn't even exist in plans. That's right, even if you add up all the plans that have been put forward -- which I'd say are a pie in the sky already -- it wouldn't work. The cherry on the rotten tart of net zero are environmental groups (infamously, Greenpeace) who are opposed to carbon capture and storage (CCS) at fossil fuel plants, and since most people can't tell the difference between CCS and carbon removal, it's getting in the way of net zero. Like with nuclear power, it's increasingly the so-called "environmentalists" who are in the way of protecting the environment. I'm not a fan of offshore drilling either, but complaining about CCS is broken logic. I'll have more details about this in the upcoming video (will be out in in a few weeks) but the more I think about it, the more I feel like the origin of this problem is presumably well-meaning activists (let's not name names) whose we-can-do-it attitude has made people think reaching net zero is much easier than it really is. These are all difficult topics with many nuances, but if I was in charge of running the world I'd quit. Sorry, I meant to say if I was in charge of running the world, my course of action would be: (a) Nuclear power everywhere it's geographically safe enough. I know that no one really likes nuclear power, but it's the least bad option to decarbonize energy intensive industry quickly. (b) Bio energy with carbon capture and storage everywhere there's large amounts of quickly re-growing biomass available, it would make sense for rich countries to finance such facilities elsewhere (c) Expand and modernize the electric grid asap because without that nothing else will work -- according to a recent IEA report there's 3000 GW (!) of renewable energy power plants waiting to be hooked up onto electric grids that can't cope (d) electric vehicles (the world is actually doing quite well with that one, if it wasn't for point (c)) (e) synthetic fuels produced with renewable energy -- it's energetically hugely inefficient but realistically the only way to decarbonize aviation quickly, you may want to do this in regions with reliable sunshine (Australia, Africa) The reason I didn't say anything about wind and solar is not that those are unimportant but that those are faict going fine. My twitter feed has been greatly enriched by @EliotJacobson who is as doom as doom gets which I think is the appropriate reaction in the current situation.