ENERGY TRANSITION EFFICIENCY

INTRODUCTION 

The Energy Transition (ET) efficiency for all mankind is the higher, the less its harmful impact to the environment, duration and cost, if the energy needs is satisfied. 

But the decisions and actions of the ET Initiators on the road to carbon neutrality in 2050 are aimed at increasing its cost-effectiveness by reducing its environmental cleaner. ET Initiators deliberately ignore the obvious facts and results of well-known scientific research, and refuse to consider, discuss and apply environmentally efficient technologies. ET has received a lot of attention as a means to overcome the crisis after the COVID-19 pandemic and to address social problems. This distracts attention from the ecology. 

Consequently, the ET Initiators decided to invest in cost-effective projects without environmental controls before the imminent marginal degradation of the environment. Then they will invest in ecological restoration. The result is "sustainable development", super-profits for investors and a bad environment for humanity. 

The suggested solution is to immediately invest in providing the environmental efficiency of ET.

Energy Transition Efficiency

The efficiency of the Energy Transition (ET) for all mankind is the higher, the less harmful effect of energetics to the environment, the duration of ET and its cost, provided that the energy needs is satisfied.

The ET Initiators, including: UNFCCC, IRENA, IEA, World Bank, European Commission and the governments of the countries, made a strategic decision to move to carbon neutrality by 2050, motivating it to the interests of all mankind (≈ 9.73 billion people). They plan to increase the volume of investments in ET from ≈ $ 500 billion in 2018 to ≈ $ 1200 billion in 2030 (total ≈ $ 11 trillion) and attract capital of institutional investors in the amount of ≈ $ 100 trillion to achieve this goal. That is, the total investment will amount to ≈ $ 111 trillion. National governments can guarantee investors a typical ROI of ≈ 30-50%. That is, they will return to investors on behalf of all mankind ≈ $ 144-167 trillion. Consequently, the average cost of ET Initiators' forced environmental services per person will be ≈ $ 14800-17163.

The advertisements of the mentioned forced services are presented in the documents of UNFCCC, IRENA, IEA, World Bank and European Commission and are unreliable. ET Initiators do not take into account the obvious facts and results of well-known scientific research, and also refuse to consider, discuss and apply effective technologies, for example:

1. The US National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) and other researchers have studied the life cycles of all types of Renewable Energy Sources (RES). They have showed that RES are not “environmentally clean”. Harmful impacts to the environment during the manufacture, transport, maintenance and disposal of RES are inevitable and may be significant. The use of RES changes the place, type and magnitude of harmful effects to the environment, but does not exclude them. Therefore, the concept of "clean energy", its synonyms and analogues are hazardous. Such concepts misinform humanity, are the basis of the passionate belief that any use of RES provides the generation of "clean energy". The erroneous decisions and actions caused by this belief are shown below. ET Initiators support this misinformation: they widely use these concepts, do not change their interpretation in their documents, dictionaries, textbooks and other sources of information.

2. NREL studies and other authors have shown that energy costs for the life cycle of the same RES may differ several times without it control. This means that the value of its energy efficiency may also differ several times. The simplest calculations show that the duration of ET will be infinite when the value of the energy efficiency of RES is below a well-defined level. Such RES cannot physically replace all Traditional Energy Sources (TES), and an increase in the volume of their implementation will accelerate the degradation of the environment. The same calculations show that the use of RES with high energy efficiency reduces the duration of ET. However, the ET Initiators rejected the free (!) Technology of choosing the best RES in terms of energy efficiency without giving a reason. This solution will increase ET duration, its cost and environmental impact. Thanks to this decision, ET Initiators invest ≈ 45% of all investments mentioned above ≈ $ 111 trillion in environmental degradation, which will amount to ≈ $ 50 trillion. Elimination of its consequences will require additional investment and time.

3. An obvious fact: the duration of ET, according to the plans of its Initiators, will be tens of years, and with low energy efficiency of RES, it will be hundreds of years or more. All this time, mankind will continue to use TES. Applying the technology to save 6-10% of fuel in TES during this time could accordingly reduce global greenhouse gas emissions. And saving 6-10% of energy in other industries could accordingly reduce its production. This would require less RES, accelerate ET, and cut costs and emissions by 12-20%. However, the European Commission in 2012 refused to make sure of the effectiveness of this technology free of charge (!) under the pretext of the lack of relevance of saving energy resources. Thanks to this refusal, the EU has wasted about 264-440 billion m³ of natural gas and ≈ 148-246 million tons of coal in 8 years to harm the environment. Wasted emission of greenhouse gases in the EU for 8 years amounted to ≈ 256-426 million tons in CO₂ equivalent.

4. An obvious fact: the impact of energy and other industries on the environment does not only consist of greenhouse gas emissions. Therefore, the strategy of long-term struggle with one type of impact is unreasonable if there is a scientific base, technology, technical and financial capabilities to systematically minimize all impacts simultaneously and in all sectors. All types of impacts are most fully reflected by the Environmental Impact Assessment, which is technically impossible to apply to minimize all types of impacts simultaneously without the technology of taking into account harmful environmental impacts. However, the ET Initiators abandoned this technology without explanation.

5. A group of researchers has compared all types of TES and RES in terms of the overall economic efficiency of investments. The most effective investments for all mankind have turned out to be ones in nuclear energy. However, the ET Initiators abandoned nuclear energy in their strategy.

The actions of the ET Initiators described above in paragraphs 1 ... 5 are aimed at reducing its effectiveness from the point of view of the interests of all mankind, because they increase its harmful impact on the environment, duration and cost. However, these actions are economically beneficial for investors and governments of countries, despite the damage to the environment: they increase the volume and economic efficiency of investments, as well as the amount of taxes collected through increased business activity. Increasing business activity is also in line with the economic interests of humanity.

The above-described contradiction between the economic interests of the ET Initiators and the environmental interests of all mankind is not fundamental; it concerns the technical details of the ET implementation. Elimination of this contradiction is possible by using the technologies mentioned in paragraphs 1 ... 5. They will increase the environmental performance of the strategy for all of humanity. The preservation of the economic interests of the ET Initiators may be reached by an agreement between them on the amount of investment, ROI and other rules, and humanity in any case will be forced to pay them the same $ 144-167 trillion for ET.

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Authors

Vladimir V. Matveev 

Director of NCT project,

mob. tel.: +79114524562 (Viber, WatsApp), e-mail:  wwmatveev@gmail.com; 

site: www.noologistics.ru

Valery V. Matveev

Vice Director for R&D of NCT project,

mob. tel.: +48519792559 (WatsApp), e-mail: ELP_Matveev@wp.pl ,

site: www.noologistics.ru

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