Europe is actually reducing energy use though, it's amazing looking at the difference between the US and Europe on that chart, given Europe is a similar sized e

Europe is actually reducing energy use though, it's amazing looking at the difference between the US and Europe on that chart, given Europe is a similar sized economy, with a larger population. If the US increase is half down to a.c. and heating, perhaps it reflects that US is just far more exposed to the impacts of climate change. As you say, we need to push zero carbon technologies in, and break the link between increased energy use (which looks inevitable) and increased carbon use. The worry is that even if we do manage to get up to a large percentage of the electricity grid using nuclear or renewables, and electrifying transport and heating, which together would be a monumental task, it will just leave us with a glut of gas, coal and oil on the market. Reduced demand will just lead to lowered prices because of massive sunk investments in exploration and production (for instance: https://www.economist.com/leaders/2019/02/09/the-truth-about-big-oil-and-climate-change https://www.economist.com/leaders/2019/02/09/the-truth-about...). In other words, to make this transition without government intervention, renewables and/or nuclear don't just need to go below the total cost of production for fossil fuels, they need to fall below even the marginal cost of production. It is a massive gamble on the ability for technology and economies of scale to reduce the costs of alternative technologies to that extent. In fact even if that happens, with someone like Trump in charge, there's a serious chance the government will try and bail out the companies that have made these bad investments, and still burn the fossil fuels even if they are uneconomic.