Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
Today the world uses 39 percent more oil, 107 percent more coal, and 131 percent more natural gas than it
did in 1980. 26
This wasn't supposed to happen.
The anti-fossil fuel experts had predicted that this would be not only deadly, but unnecessary due to
the cutting-edge promise of solar and wind (sound familiar?). Then as now, environmental leaders were
arguing that renewable energy combined with conservation—using less energy—was a viable replacement
for fossil fuels.
Amory Lovins wrote in 1976: “Recent research suggests that a largely or wholly solar economy can be
constructed in the United States with straightforward soft technologies that are now demonstrated and now
economic or nearly economic.” 27 Lovins was a sensation, and around the globe governments gave solar
(and wind and ethanol) companies billions of dollars in the hope that they would be able to generate cheap,
plentiful, reliable energy.
Butasthelastgraphillustrates, thisdidnothappen.Solarandwindareaminuscule portionofworlden-
ergy use. And even that is misleading because fossil fuel energy is reliable whereas solar and wind aren't.
While energy from, say, coal is available on demand so you can keep a refrigerator—or a respirator—on
whenever you need it, solar energy is available only when the sun shines and the clouds cooperate, which
means it can work only if it's combined with a reliable source of energy, such as coal, gas, nuclear, or hy-
dro. 28
Why did fossil fuel energy outcompete renewable energy—not just for existing energy production but
for most new energy production? This trend is too consistent across too many countries to be ignored. The
answer is simply that renewable energy couldn't meet those countries' energy needs, though fossil fuels
could. While many countries wanted solar and wind, and in fact used a lot of their citizens' money to prop
up solar and wind companies, no one could figure out a cost-effective, scalable process to take sunlight
and wind, which are dilute and intermittent forms of energy, and turn them into cheap, plentiful, reliable
energy.
So despite the warnings of leading experts, people around the world nearly doubled their use of fossil
fuels.
Accordingtothepredictionsofthemostpopularexperts,whoassuredusthattheirconclusionsreflected
the best science, this should have led to utter catastrophe. But the result was one of the greatest-ever im-
provements in human life.
This topic is about morality, about right and wrong. To me, the question of what to do about fossil fuels
andanyothermoralissuecomesdownto:Whatwillpromotehumanlife?Whatwillpromotehuman flour-
ishing —realizing the full potential of life? Colloquially, how do we maximize the years in our life and
the life in our years? When we look at the recent past, the past that was supposed to be so disastrous, we
should look at flourishing—and that of course includes the quality (or lack thereof) of our environment.
And there is an incredibly strong correlation between fossil fuel use and life expectancy and between
fossil fuel use and income, particularly in the rapidly developing parts of the world. Figures 1.2 and 1.3
show recent trends in China and India of fossil fuel use, life expectancy, and income.
There is no perfect measure of flourishing, but one really good measure is life expectancy—the average
number of years in the life of a human being. Another good one, for less obvious reasons, is average in-
come. This is valuable because while in a sense “money can't buy happiness,” it gives us resources and,
therefore, time and opportunity to pursue our happiness. It's hard to be happy when you don't know where
your next meal is coming from. The more opportunity you have to do what you want with your time, the
more opportunity you have to be happy.
 
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