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G-20 Climate Talks Threatened by Clash over Coal Ahead of COP26
- joemazerino 5y agoHow many coal plants is China firing up this year? I lost track
- 99_00 5y agoAnd more in the future. >It now has 97.8 GW of coal-fired power under construction, and another 151.8 GW at the planning stage. https://www.reuters.com/article/china-coal-idUSL4N2E20HS https://www.reuters.com/article/china-coal-idUSL4N2E20HS
- glogla 5y agoHopefully they reevaluate that, since they already have coal shortages for the coal plants they already have.
- 99_00 5y agoWhat would they use instead? Coal power is an input into solar panels. Solar Power May Be the Next Victim of China’s Coal Shortage >Prices of silicon metal, used to make the material that comprises solar panels, have surged about 300% since the start of August after a top-producing province ordered production be slashed amid a power crunch. https://www.bloombergquint.com/business/china-slashes-silicon-output-signaling-higher-solar-panel-costs https://www.bloombergquint.com/business/china-slashes-silico...
- vkou 5y agoSince you've lost track: China added a net 29.8 GW of coal power to its grid in 2020. (~35 GW added, ~6 GW decomissioned) It also added a net 71.6 GW of wind power, 48.2 GW of solar power. It's also adding ~6 GW of nuclear power/per year.
- melling 5y ago“ China, the world's largest emitter of greenhouse gases, generates one thousand gigawatts of coal power domestically, accounting for over half of the globe's total and more than four times that of the second- and third-largest users (India)” Sounds like a big problem
- vkou 5y agoChina's per capita emissions are lower than the developed world [1], and most of India lives in absolute poverty. Are you advocating for each country receiving the exact same emissions cap, disregarding population? Or do you think its fair for billions of people to remain in absolute poverty, while a few hundred million in the developed world pollute four times more than their fair share? [1] Not to mention that much of the developed world's pollution is outsourced to China. Where do you think all the consumer goods you use are made?
- melling 5y agoYes, 1.2 billion people need a lot of energy. India has another 1.3 billion. They’re going to need more power too. Coal? I agree that 340 million Americans need to reduce emissions. Coal is now 20% of electricity. We seem to be waiting for renewables and batteries. Globally, 40% of electricity comes from coal. At the end of the day, if we use all that coal for much longer, we are going to have a big problem
- ClumsyPilot 5y ago"Americans need to reduce emissions. Coal is now 20% of electricity." Currently each American produces twice the emission each Chinese or French does
- vkou 5y ago> we are going to have a big problem Yes, we will. We need to tax the hell out of it, and tariff any country that does not institute an equivalent tax. But we'd rather grouse about foreign use of coal, rather than install a tax - because any such tax, at the moment, would hurt us[1] a lot more than it hurts them. [1] Well, some of us.
- newaccount2021 5y agowhy can't anyone say it? these summits are useless. League-Of-Nations level useless. nothing is accomplished, none of the major players are committed to anything more than virtue signalling...
- aww_dang 5y agoFirst define the ends which the conference should be useful towards.
- SpicyLemonZest 5y agoWell, they can’t say it because it’s not true. The Paris agreement is associated with a substantial change in our “current policies” climate trajectory (https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/10/25/climate/world-climate-pledges-cop26.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/10/25/climate/world...), and that was before a large paradigm shift in the cost of renewables.
- it_citizen 5y agoExactly! The Paris agreement provided an anchor. Now every climate policy is put in relation with how it helps to reach the 2 degree target. We hear about it all the time. We might be off-track to meet the goal but it was nevertheless a massive step forward to frame the debate.
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- 99_00 5y agoThey provide an excellent opportunity for China to convince developed countries to buy its solar panels, all while China increases the number of coal plants every year. So, in that sense it accomplishes a lot.
- black6 5y agoIt's just a drinking club. Would you stop hanging out with your globalist buddies on the taxpayer's dime if no one had the power to stop you?
- algebraically 5y agoNuclear solves all these problems and potentially buys enough time to figure out how to mitigate the worst effects of 2C+ degrees of warming which at this point is basically inevitable. France seems to be the only sane nation in the world right now while everyone else is doubling down on what brought us to this point. [1] > France has 56 nuclear power reactors in operation, with two units closing in 2020 at Fessenheim (61 370 MW(e)) and one EPR reactor under construction at the Flamanville site. Nuclear power plants accounted for 70.6% of total French electricity generation in 2019, and about 90% of France’s electricity comes from low carbon sources (nuclear and renewable). 1: https://cnpp.iaea.org/countryprofiles/France/France.htm https://cnpp.iaea.org/countryprofiles/France/France.htm
- i_am_proteus 5y agoSmaller reactors (which may be, but are not necessarily, "modular") should help with both the build time and cost overrun issue. The USA has been successfully building small reactors on time, on budget, more or less continuously since the 1950s - they've just been going into warships and submarines and not commercial generating stations.
- teachrdan 5y agoOne problem is that military nuclear reactors use more highly refined uranium in order to reduce reactor size. This makes them more valuable targets for terrorists and thus require greater security. Not hard to accomplish on an aircraft carrier, but this would increase cost for a civilian reactor.
- spaetzleesser 5y agoFrom my experience military equipment is not designed to be efficient in terms of cost. I am pretty sure their designs can’t be used for commercially viable power. They are also operated in super secure environments like submarines and aircraft carriers. Harder to secure a large number of commercial plants all over the country. Even accidents are much more forgiving out on the ocean vs on land.
- 99_00 5y agoIf it's true that solar is cheaper than coal, how is it possible that countries are reluctant to move away from coal? Either countries and companies like to burn money. Or the statement that solar is cheaper than coal is deceptive. Plunging Prices Mean Building New Renewable Energy Is Cheaper Than Running Existing Coal https://www.forbes.com/sites/energyinnovation/2018/12/03/plunging-prices-mean-building-new-renewable-energy-is-cheaper-than-running-existing-coal/?sh=74d0cbe231f3 https://www.forbes.com/sites/energyinnovation/2018/12/03/plu...
- adamsvystun 5y agoWhile solar is cheaper, the problems are regulatory. Read more here: https://austinvernon.site/blog/renewablesregulatory.html https://austinvernon.site/blog/renewablesregulatory.html
- mayama 5y agoSolar is cheaper than coal only when sun shines brightest in the noon, while the peak demand is generally around sunset. Solar energy generation is anywhere from 30-50% of nameplate capacity depending on location. This necessitates, additional solar equivalent capacity installation of peaker plants, or base load plants to cater to sunlight unavailable hours. Newer storage tech is needed to address the situation like batteries, hydro or concentrated solar etc. Almost all of them are costlier than straight up burning coal or gas now. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duck_curve https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duck_curve
- sp332 5y agoThere's a huge number of people in fossil fuel industries. Not only mining and refining, but gas stations and fuel oil truckers etc. It will be very disruptive to tell all those people that their jobs are obsolete and to find something else to do. And the land end equipment that all those companies had bought is now worthless, then they can't pay their loans, so you have to bail out them or at least their banks, so the banks have some money they can lend to other people.
- throw63738 5y agoWe just survived the worst crisis of century. Perhaps it makes sense to put this plan on hold for couple of years. Or find something a bit more cost effective.
- diordiderot 5y agoYou think this crisis is bad, wait for the ones coming after we 'hold off'
- tinco 5y agoWe just survived the worst crisis of the century, which was totally foreseeable and would have been a lot less bad if we had properly prepared as the experts advised us to do for decades. So let's definitely hold off on preparing for this other inevitable crisis that experts have been warning us about for decades. You know what's not cost effective? Digging coal out of the ground for cents on the dollar that the crisis is actually gonna cost us in the next 50 years.
- tifadg1 5y agoI think it'll ultimately be China who starts the greenvolution, but not in a grand way. * it has started restructuring its economy to be more longterm oriented. Banning for-profit education, tightening mega corps, exploring ways to encourage child bearing. * belt-and-road - as well as being a cashcow longterm, it also gives leverage to push your vision. And with that vision being free - china pays for it now - it'll be a much easier sell than trying to convince western world to give money to developing world as per paris climate accords (which by and large remain unimplemented). Now certainly it'll take a while. US could do it now by imposing an import tax if the supply chain is dirty, but there's no heartfelt urgency. And is there urgency really? I mean what do the timelines look like if nothing really changes?
- foolzcrow 5y agoOur economy is being tanked on purpose. Like in 1933. Great Reset = Rich buy us out for pennies.