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Still works out though? renewables ~30% of electricity now, coal 30% of electricity when it undertook the industrial revolution. I'm making the assumption that
by benj111 7y ago
Still works out though? renewables ~30% of electricity now, coal 30% of electricity when it undertook the industrial revolution. I'm making the assumption that the industrial revolution was overwhelmingly powered by coal, which seems reasonable, I'm not sure how to go about accounting for horses though.
- dogma1138 7y agoIt was but it’s also not a super interesting figure, burning coal today and during the industrial revolution is completely different and so is the reason why we stopped it it’s less about the environment and more about newer more efficient gas turbines and and cheap North Sea gas as well access to Russian natural gas resources post Cold War. If you look at when coal usage in Europe started to slow down it ties directly to those two sources rather than an environmental policy. Despite the availability of renewables the need for energy isn’t slowing down so the total emissions while dampened a bit aren’t slowing down that much either, at least not because of that.
- benj111 7y agoI thought it was an interesting figure. The amount of renewables we have now would have been sufficient for all but the last 150 years, it puts it in context, and indicates to me it probably is possible to move to 100% renewables. Obviously that is a point of view though, and we are free to disagree :)