Thank you for sharing another article. I will add this to my reading list. Yes it appears abundant, renewable and cheap energy is central to everything. I appreciate your positivity here that this will happen. I agree DAC and renewable energy need to go together to make any sense. I haven't researched it enough, but at the moment I'm skeptical we will be able to continue an increasing energy trajectory with solar and wind alone. I find it a very confusing picture to look at. Especially when extraction (ecological damage of mining) and availability of raw materials are added to it! Perhaps to solve one environmental issue such as lowering CO2 concentration we need to accept some other factors like habit / ecological loss are needed. No magic wands have been found as yet.
This is a great article with a lot of useful data. Have you looked into the energy demands of atmospheric direct air capture and storage to achieve a meaningful result? I wonder what amount of electricity would be required to do this and to see that represented as a % of total other demand. I understand it's not particularly energy efficient and could require a lot of additional electrical power to achieve meaningful results. Although I hope this isn't the case. As we are already struggling to produce anything like 100% renewable energy to meet current demands, if we then require a lot more renewable energy for DAC, then where is the best use case for this technology?
It will ultimately take thousands of TWh to scale up DAC, and there's no point doing DAC if we aren't on a long-term trajectory to power it with renewable energy.
Would note that, besides planting trees, every solution to climate change needs a ton of energy. Even creating solar / batteries is an energy intensive process
To solve climate change we need energy abundance, and in the long-term I'm bullish that we'll (1) get there and (2) that it will be mostly renewable energy coming online given much improved economics
Thank you for sharing another article. I will add this to my reading list. Yes it appears abundant, renewable and cheap energy is central to everything. I appreciate your positivity here that this will happen. I agree DAC and renewable energy need to go together to make any sense. I haven't researched it enough, but at the moment I'm skeptical we will be able to continue an increasing energy trajectory with solar and wind alone. I find it a very confusing picture to look at. Especially when extraction (ecological damage of mining) and availability of raw materials are added to it! Perhaps to solve one environmental issue such as lowering CO2 concentration we need to accept some other factors like habit / ecological loss are needed. No magic wands have been found as yet.
Agree. A true Nuclear Renaissance is the one possible magic wand (complete with deregulation, innovation, and rapidly declining costs)
This is a great article with a lot of useful data. Have you looked into the energy demands of atmospheric direct air capture and storage to achieve a meaningful result? I wonder what amount of electricity would be required to do this and to see that represented as a % of total other demand. I understand it's not particularly energy efficient and could require a lot of additional electrical power to achieve meaningful results. Although I hope this isn't the case. As we are already struggling to produce anything like 100% renewable energy to meet current demands, if we then require a lot more renewable energy for DAC, then where is the best use case for this technology?
DAC requires a lot of energy today, though that will decline with time. Recently wrote this piece:
https://www.terraformnow.com/p/direct-air-captures-supposed-energy
It will ultimately take thousands of TWh to scale up DAC, and there's no point doing DAC if we aren't on a long-term trajectory to power it with renewable energy.
Would note that, besides planting trees, every solution to climate change needs a ton of energy. Even creating solar / batteries is an energy intensive process
To solve climate change we need energy abundance, and in the long-term I'm bullish that we'll (1) get there and (2) that it will be mostly renewable energy coming online given much improved economics