Energy abundance is not the same thing as abundant energy

We’re living in an energy hellscape. 

Wars in Iran and Ukraine are supercharging world energy prices as cruise missiles target oil tankers and drones attack still-radioactive Chernobyl and operational nuclear plants in five countries, some believed to support covert nuclear weapons development. 

Less visibly, local pollution from fossil fuels causes one in five deaths worldwide. Record-breaking climate disasters claimed 14,000 lives — and  $2 billion in crop losses — during this summer’s historic European heat wave, followed by the evacuation of more than 300,000 people from wildfires. Meanwhile, misinformation, subsidies and policies drive emissions upward. 

Against this grim backdrop, the emerging Abundance movement — popularized by Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson — envisions plentiful, secure and clean energy for all, but astutely faults itself for failing to offer a compelling roadmap. The underlying problem is a narrow supply-side emphasis that reinforces false choices, downplays juicy customer-side opportunities, and fuels dreams of expanding energy production for wasteful uses.

A more nuanced vision recognizes energy abundance as fundamentally different from abundant energy. A signature strategy of the Abundance movement, indoor factory-farming, requires a hundred times more energy than outdoor agriculture for a given harvest, and solar arrays sprawling across vastly more land. Overbuilding clean energy squanders money and invites environmental harms.

Advocates stray further off track when seeking to simply replace today’s energy supplies with cleaner sources. Experts call this the primary energy fallacy: equating raw energy with useful energy. The gap is huge. A stunning two-thirds of fossil fuel is squandered,  much as waste heat, before it benefits users. The same work can be done with far less combustion-free renewables.

Using energy efficiently is less photogenic than windmills, but even more powerful. Efficiency’s near invisibility........

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