Deniers Panicking ahead of Clean Energy Tidal Wave
The industry must have added some supplemental funding for Bjorn Lomborg, the cynical soft-denial specialist from Denmark. He’s accelerated his output of fudged and distorted talking points, focusing on disinformation about clean energy. The above graph purports to show some kind of suspiciously abrupt and steep change in “voltage exceedances” on European grids, which he ties to solar energy deployment. Which would beg the question, ‘Did Europe suddenly deploy several thousand percent more solar fields in a 6 month time span?” Fortunately, fact based watch dogs are following.
The use of primary energy on the vertical axis is an old trick by the fossil fuel industry to mislead people into thinking that one unit of fossils = one unit of renewables. In fact, one unit of primary energy for wind or solar electricity is the equivalent of three units of fossil fuels for electricity.
Another trick is to pretend we need all those fossils if we switched to renewables. In fact, if we switch to renewables, 12% of the fossil fuel energy disappears because that is how much energy is used to mine-transport-refine fossil fuels+uranium for energy, and we wouldn’t need to do that anymore
A third trick is to pretend we need so much energy if we go to all electricity powered by renewables. In that case, because EVs use 75% less energy than gasoline/diesel vehicles, heat pumps use 75% less energy than combustion heating, etc., energy demand goes down another 42%.
In sum, this plot illustrates the real story of where we are and where we need to go. The proper metric is end-use energy, not primary energy.
“Primary energy is the energy naturally embodied in chemical bonds in raw fuels, such as coal, oil, fossil gas, biomass, uranium, and in renewable (hydroelectric, solar, wind, and geothermal) electricity, before the fuel has been subjected to any conversion process.”
“End-use energy demand (also called energy consumption) is energy directly used by a consumer. It is the energy embodied in electricity, fossil gas, gasoline, diesel, kerosene, and jet fuel that people use directly. It equals primary energy minus the energy lost in converting primary energy to end-use energy, including the energy lost during transmission and distribution and due to waste heat.”
“The conversion from primary energy to end-use energy differs for different energy sectors and types of fuels. In the electricity sector, for example, end-use energy equals primary energy minus the energy lost during the generation, transmission, and distribution of electricity. When coal is burned to produce electricity, only about one-third of the energy embodied in the coal is converted to electricity. The rest is waste heat.
Further, some of the electricity produced is lost during transmission and distribution. The end-use electricity in this case is the electricity that consumers use in the end. It does not include the heat lost during the conversion of coal to electricity or the energy lost during transmission and distribution of the electricity from the power plant to where it is used.” “In another example, solar electricity produced by a PV panel is primary energy. Some of that electricity is lost during transmission and distribution.
The solar electricity that actually reaches a consumer after transmission and distribution losses is end-use energy. Similarly, electricity produced at a hydropower plant is primary energy. The electricity remaining after transmission and distribution losses is end-use energy.”
“In the transportation sector, the energy embodied in crude oil is primary energy. Converting crude oil to end-use products, including gasoline, diesel, kerosene, refinery gas, and jet fuel, involves little loss of the primary energy in crude oil, so the end-use energy in these cases is close to, but not the same as, the primary energy in crude oil.”
“Fossil gas used for heating and cooking is similar to fossil gas recovered from a well, so primary energy and end-use energy are similar. On the other hand, when fossil gas is burned for electricity, only a portion of the fossil gas is converted to electricity and some of that electricity is lost during transmission and distribution.
As such, the end-use energy in the delivered electricity is much less than the primary energy in the fossil gas used to create the electricity.”
