Crunch Time for Renewable Energy Deployment

Trump and Netanyahu’s ill-considered war on Iran has brought us to a situation where 20% of the world’s oil supply is bottled up in the Persian Gulf. If the war continues–and none of the participants show signs of backing down–the price of crude oil is expected to double over time. Other raw materials are bottled up in the Gulf as well, fertilizer, and helium, important for chip manufacture.

Faced with the worst energy crisis in history, some countries, at least, will be turning to renewables, and we are not ready. We don’t yet have the smart grid, required to equitably distribute energy from diffuse wind and solar power. We don’t yet have plans for balancing the seasonal variability of these sources with stable baseload power. The only developed non-greenhouse gas producing grid-scale baseload energy technologies we have are nuclear and large-scale hydroelectric, both expensive, unpopular, and with long construction lead times. The Trump administration is opposed to the development of renewable energy technology, and is in the process of shutting down, or at least redirecting, the National Renewable Energy Lab, one of the premier renewable energy research institutions. And China, the major supplier of photovoltaics and electric cars, is relying on slave labor to produce them.

This is the situation I foresaw almost seven years ago. I never dreamed it would come about so soon; I expected another generation of delay. But we are here now, and must deal.