(The Conversation) – Australia is on the cusp of a once-in-a-generation transformation, as our energy systems shift to clean, renewable forms of power. First Nations peoples, the original custodians of this land, must be central to – and benefit from – this transition.

That is the key message of the federal government’s new First Nations Clean Energy Strategy, launched on Friday. The government has committed A$70 million to help realise its aims.

I was part of a committee that helped guide the government on the strategy. It involved more than a year of consultation with First Nations communities across Australia, plus input from industry and state and territory governments.

Australia has pledged to reach net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. Of the renewable energy infrastructure needed to achieve this, about half will be developed on First Nations land.

First Nations peoples have cared for Country for 65,000 years. Australia’s renewable energy transition must be on their terms. The strategy released today will guide this process – so let’s take a look at what it contains.

Image by Török Töce Tibor from Pixabay

Photo by João Romano on Unsplash

Morocco’s Atalayer reports that Rabat will attempt to double sustainable energy generation in the Sahara by 2030.

What is so special about 2030? It is the soccer World Cup centenary, a World Cup for the ages. The first World Cup was held in Uruguay in 1930.

Spain, Portugal and Morocco jointly submitted the successful bid as hosts that year, with each country providing 6 or 7 stadiums. For Morocco, this success boosts its prestige in the Arab world and Africa. Countries fight tooth and nail over this honor. Qatar’s successful bid for the 2022 World Cup was one of the reasons Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates imposed an economic boycott on it 2017-2020. They were that jealous.

So Morocco wants literally to shine in 2030, by showing off its impressive progress toward greening its grid.

Morocco gets 44% of its electricity from renewables, up from 37% only 3 years ago. It has about 4.6 gigawatts of green energy.

About 1.3 GW of Morocco’s wind and solar plants are sited in the Western Sahara, a region Morocco absorbed in 1975-1979 when Spanish colonialism there ended. Some of the Amazigh tribes there had long ties with the Moroccan monarchy before the 1884 Spanish conquest. Some of the 600,000 people in Western Sahara, however, weren’t happy to become part of Morocco, and the POLISARIO party has long led a movement for independence.

But Morocco is a country of 38 million people, and its military is the 5th most powerful in Africa. So it has gradually made its claims stick, de facto. Moreover, most economists don’t consider the Western Sahara to have the makings of a viable independent country. What is important is that they have a democratic say in their own affairs.

Plus the Trump family helped the Moroccan government in this endeavor.

The Trump family?

Yes, Kushner persuaded Morocco to join the Abraham Accords recognizing Israel. In return, the United States recognized the Moroccan claim on the Western Sahara.

And now that it was the U.S. position, French President Emmanuel Macron swung around and also recognized the territory as Moroccan.

Billionaire Moroccan Prime Minister Aziz Akhannouch intends to install another 1.4 gigawatts of wind and solar capacity into the Sahara. Integrating the territory into the country’s green energy grid is one of the ways Rabat is weaving it into the fabric of the country’s economy.

Akhannouch will put $2.1 billion into these projects, and they will generate green energy jobs for the local population.

The entire episode demonstrates the ways in which renewable energy is increasingly intertwined with nation-building projects, with all their virtues and vices.

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Bonus video added by Informed Comment:

The World’s Largest Concentrated Solar Power Plant | A Brief History of the Future | PBS

The EU has begun a probe into Chinese wind turbine companies. Then-Commission Executive Vice-President for Competition Margarethe Vestager warned that a wave of subsidised Chinese wind turbine exports: “is not only dangerous for our competitiveness. It also jeopardises our economic security.” The EU remains scarred by its loss of a trade war to China over the bloc’s solar power industry a decade earlier. Western governments and activists have also expressed concerns that China’s green sector is tied to human rights abuses like forced labour in Xinjiang.

In the Middle East, however, many governments remain open to Chinese green sector exports and have struck commercial agreements to gain investment from its major firms. In July, Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund struck joint investment deals with Chinese solar power companies Jinko Solar and TCL Zhonghuan. Meanwhile, Saudi investment business ALGIHAZ signed a contract to build an energy storage facility with Chinese company Sungrow. The Australian Griffith Asia Institute calculated that altogether Chinese firms worked on green energy projects across the Middle East worth about $9.5 billion over 2018-2023.

Middle Eastern States Piggyback Off China

China’s government and Chinese state-owned or state-linked companies have been able to offer commercial and political advantages to Middle Eastern governments seeking to decarbonize their economies. Western engineering and manufacturing firms’ projects are regulated by numerous rules intended to prevent corruption, environmental harm and other negative development outcomes. Chinese companies under the direction of the ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP) face no such restraints, though the quality of the infrastructure they have produced under China’s signature Belt & Road Project (BRI) initiative has varied. For autocratic Middle Eastern governments like the Gulf monarchies, however, Chinese companies have the ability to build high-technology critical infrastructure without the need to appease external stakeholders like the human rights groups or independent media outlets found in Western countries.

“Xi of Arabia,”

Chinese companies are also generally happy to operate in a Middle Eastern business environment that still often relies on patronage to get deals done. The CCP has cultivated particularly close ties with Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Iran, Egypt, and Algeria, with whose governments Beijing has signed comprehensive strategic partnerships (the most elevated type of bilateral agreement with China). These relationships have borne increasing fruit as the BRI has matured and new technology has widened the appeal of clean energy and other green industries. Petrostates like Saudi Arabia have belatedly woken up to the threat of climate change and their own potential ability to take advantage of clean energy like solar power.

Doing Deals to Decarbonize

Chinese President Xi Jinping met with UAE President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan in Beijing in June. Xi promised his government would cooperate more closely with the Arab country on a range of industries including “information technology, artificial intelligence, the digital economy, and new energy.” China was already the UAE’s biggest trading partner in 2022 while the Arab state was Beijing’s biggest Arab trading partner, the UAE’s economy ministry said in 2023. While renewable energy development is only one aspect of the burgeoning diplomatic and trading relationship between the two sides, it is an important consideration for the UAE and its Net Zero 2050 strategy to decarbonize the country’s economy. Given China’s private sector is subordinate to the political aims of the ruling CCP, further Chinese green investment is likely to flow to the UAE in 2025. The UAE is also investing in renewables in East Asia, with its green energy firm Masdar aiming to install 2 gigawatts of renewable power in ASEAN countries by 2025. The firm was invited by the Philippines government to invest in Manila’s green sector too.

In May, the UAE’s Minister of State for Foreign Trade Thani bin Ahmed Al Zeyoudi, said “new energy” and “critical minerals” were among the areas the country was interested in engaging with Beijing. Chinese CEOs held meetings with UAE officials in July following the UAE president’s state visit to discuss bilateral cooperation in various areas, including solar power and renewable energy. The UAE’s example is being replicated by other Middle Eastern governments with whom China has cultivated close relations. At the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation in September, Egypt signed agreements worth more than $1.1 billion with Chinese companies, which included the country’s first green chemical plant. China’s Befar Group will build a $500 million facility powered energy sources including natural gas, wind and solar energy. A second deal involves the creation of a $100 million solar panel factory. Chinese companies are building solar power plants in Algeria and becoming investors and co-investors in Saudi and UAE solar and wind projects as these two countries decarbonise their power grids.

China Seeks to Refute Dumping Narratives

Meanwhile, Middle Eastern demand for Chinese clean energy infrastructure and products allows Beijing to claim it is not engaged in overproduction in sectors like EV manufacturing or renewable energy products and dumping the resulting excess on foreign markets. Much criticism of Chinese trade practices in the country’s green industries has come from the US and other Western governments. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said in April that excess Chinese manufacturing capacity in sectors like EVs and solar panels was intensifying. Chinese state media and CEOs like the head of vehicle manufacturer Great Wall Motor International have denied this, although non-Western countries like Turkey have also imposed tariffs on Chinese exports like EVs. China has taken Turkey to the World Trade Organization in response.

Trade tensions between China and governments under pressure to restrict Chinese green technology exports are likely to endure in many parts of the world. In the Middle East, however, Beijing and local regimes continue to discover synergies between their development needs. China’s sluggish economy and growing trade tensions with the Global North have left it in need of new markets for its goods. Meanwhile, Middle Eastern governments need the country’s know-how and deep pockets if they are to overhaul their own 20^th-century fossil fuel infrastructure and create new jobs in the emerging green economies of the 21^st century. 

Noise pollution, a longstanding menace, is often ignored. It has, however, been making headlines in recent years, thanks to the booming development of massive, boxy, windowless buildings filled with computer servers that process data and handle internet traffic. Those servers generate extreme amounts of heat, the removal of which requires powerful water-chilling equipment. That includes arrays of large fans that, in turn, generate a thunderous wall of noise. Such installations, known by the innocuous term “data centers,” are making growing numbers of people miserable.

Residents of Loudoun County, Virginia, the nation’s data-center epicenter, have filed dozens of complaints about an especially loud facility located in the town of Leesburg. People living as much as three miles from the center compared the noise from its giant cooling fans to the sounds of an airplane engine, a freight train, a huge leaf blower, or a helicopter hovering overhead, day and night.

Attorneys representing a group of Williston, North Dakota, homeowners argued last December that noise pollution from the nearby Atlas Power Data Center “is a continual invasion of their homes, their health, and their North Dakota way of life. They are now virtually shut-ins in the slice of North Dakota they once called their own.” In April, Gladys Anderson of Bono, Arkansas, told reporters that a nearby cryptocurrency-mining data center was “like torture, like a form of military-grade torture.” Her neighbor complained, “It’s caused problems for me with my hearing, my blood pressure, with the sweetheart where she gets migraine headaches.”

Chicago-based airline pilot Joshua Zhang — someone who (I’m betting) knows a thing or two about loud noise — told CBS News in 2021 that a new data center in his Printers’ Row neighborhood whined like a gigantic vacuum cleaner that never shuts off. “I try to fly as much as I can to stay away from here,” he said. “I can’t really sleep well… and I have to operate a flight.” In other words, the data center’s ear-splitting noise was so bad that it drove Mr. Zhang to seek refuge at… O’Hare Airport.

Noise Makes Us Sick and We’re Sick of Noise

The recent, rapid proliferation of data centers has been due, at least in part, to the similarly rapid growth of two types of enterprises: cryptocurrency and artificial intelligence (AI). Those voracious wasters of electricity were unasked-for inventions that filled largely nonexistent human needs. And they’re amplifying the very real problem of noise pollution.  

Crypto and AI illustrate a larger issue. An all-out effort to curb climate change will require deep reductions in the use of fossil fuels, which will, in turn, require more frugal use of all forms of energy. And if that happens (as it should), it will have profound repercussions throughout society. As one of the more welcome consequences, our now-cacophonous world is likely to become easier on the ears.

With every AI project abandoned, every bitcoin not mined, every pickup truck not sold, every jet fighter not flown, people somewhere will get relief. With every bicycle that replaces a motorcycle, every garden hose that supplants a power-washer, every rake that displaces a leaf blower, our world will both warm a little more slowly and become a little less noisy.

The severe impact of noise pollution on both mental and physical health is well documented. Hearing impairment is the most obvious malady it causes. The World Health Organization (WHO) finds that noise pollution severely disrupts our quality of life in other ways, too, raising the risk of heart disease, childhood cognitive impairment, sleep disturbance, and general annoyance. WHO notes that while

“. . . annoyance is not normally classified as a health effect, it certainly affects well-being and therefore is considered to fall within the WHO definition of health as being ‘a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being.’ More importantly, however, it is the effect of noise that most lay people are aware of and concerned about.”

And annoyance can be a gateway to much worse, to “feelings of disturbance, aggravation, dissatisfaction, concern, bother, displeasure, harassment, irritation, nuisance, vexation, exasperation, discomfort, uneasiness, distress, hate, etc.” You might think I got that quote from a thesaurus, but, no, it’s from a study published in the journal Noise and Health. Any person living near a data center or other source of loud, continuous noise can, I expect, attest to having experienced most (or all) of those feelings. And it’s well known that such stresses can lead to physiological health problems.

Buy the Book

When it comes to making people miserable, keep in mind that not all noises are created equal. The roar from data centers, vehicle traffic, commercial lawn-care operations, and other notorious disturbers of the peace is rich in low-pitched audible frequencies that travel much further than others and can even pass through walls. Such low tones also irritate us more, even when they aren’t all that loud. Consequently, and unfortunately, people complaining about their exposure to noise from data centers or other sources of low-frequency noise are all too often dismissed as hypochondriacs. In a recent, comprehensive article on noise pollution in the Atlantic magazine, Bianca Bosker told a gripping tale of how people in Chandler, Arizona, suffered for years as their complaints about data center noise were casually dismissed by local authorities.

The Cruelty Is the Point

For those of us not living near a data center, road traffic may be the most pervasive, day-to-day source of unhealthful low-frequency noise. In the European Union, for example, 113 million people, or 20% percent of the population, live with noise pollution from road traffic that’s loud enough to raise risks of heart disease and heart failure. The risk of developing diabetes, obesity, anxiety, depression, and of course, sleep disturbance also increases as traffic noise gets louder.

Of course, we produce traffic noise collectively and most, but not all, of us hate it. In an April essay entitled “What is Noise?,” New Yorker music critic Alex Ross observed that “if you elect to hear something, it is not noise, even if most people might deem it unspeakably horrible. If you are forced to hear something, it is noise, even if most people might deem it ineffably gorgeous.” Extra-loud vehicles, particularly en masse, richly illustrate Ross’s observation.

In recent decades, American pickup trucks and SUVs have grown steadily larger and heavier, with towering front ends and armoring that create a road-ruling mystique. Increasingly, to further satisfy consumer demand for big, intimidating vehicles, automakers equip many of them with high-decibel engines, turbochargers, and thunderous exhaust systems. Drivers all too regularly dial the volume up several more notches with muffler modifications that are often illegal. The automakers’ economic motivation for offering big, loud vehicles is clear ($$$), but why exactly do their customers want them? The deafening din emanating from those trucks has distinct political undertones, but there may also be something deeper going on.

A 2023 study published in the journal Current Issues in Personality Psychology sheds some light on this. The researcher interviewed 529 people, split almost equally between the sexes, about their attitudes toward noisy vehicles. Then, using questionnaires, she evaluated the subjects for four “dark” personality traits: Machiavellianism, narcissism, psychopathy, and sadism. It turned out (surprise!) that men liked loud vehicles significantly more than women did. Across both sexes, those who expressed greater fondness for such vehicles also tended to score higher for two dark personality traits: psychopathy and sadism. The researcher drily observed that the results made perfect sense:

“Psychopathy reflects an up-close cruelty, whereas sadism includes viewing the harm to others from a distance… Modifying a muffler to make a car louder is disturbing to pedestrians, other drivers, and animals at a distance, meeting the sadism component, as well as startling when [the victim is] up close at intersections, meeting the psychopathy component.

The author of that study is not a medical professional (nor am I); still, it’s not exactly illogical to consider guys who alter their trucks to produce brain-rattling noise psychopaths. I’m not a lawyer either, but it still seems to me that labeling such practices a form of reckless indifference to human well-being is anything but unreasonable.  

Quietness Should Be a Right, Not a Privilege

For decades, the environmental justice movement has been fighting a longstanding American tradition of locating dirty, dangerous industries and activities in low-income, racialized communities. This is a problem that arises with every environmental issue, and noise is no exception. Alex Ross recognized that in his “What Is Noise?” essay when he observed, “Silence is a luxury of the rich… For the rest of society, noise is an index of struggle.”  

In neighborhoods with lower socioeconomic status and/or large Indigenous, Asian, Black, or Latino populations, residents endure greater exposure to noise pollution, especially in areas where informal racial segregation is more severe. Not surprisingly, a separate study found that the same demographic groups experience highly disproportionate levels of annoyance from noise caused by road traffic or aircraft.

Consider it a certain irony then that, despite being exposed to less noise pollution, white Americans are subject to significantly higher rates of hearing loss than Black Americans — and it’s unclear why. Andrew Van Dam of the Washington Post complicated matters further when he noted that there’s also a political disparity: the higher the share of Republicans in a state or county, the greater the rate of hearing loss. He couldn’t fully explain this as a result of populations in redder states being generally whiter and older. There had to be some other factor. When Van Dam looked further, he found one that made a big difference in the prevalence of hearing loss: politically redder areas have higher rates of recreational firearm ownership than bluer areas, with lots more hunting and gun-range target practice — another kind of noise pollution entirely.

No Peace, No Quiet

The U.S. military also has lots of guns, as well as an enormous climate footprint. A dramatic downsizing of our war-making capacity (and the staggering Pentagon budgets that go with it) — badly needed for both humanitarian and ecological reasons — would have the salutary side-effect of shrinking one of our major sources of noise pollution and hearing loss.

It should come as no surprise that researchers in a wide range of countries have found that hearing loss is more common among military personnel than in the general population. Among American service members, almost 15% suffer hearing impairment. Hearing loss is one of the most common health problems of veterans, especially those who served in special forces units (where it’s twice as prevalent as elsewhere in the armed forces). The exposure of those in such units to large-caliber weapon fire, urban combat training, and the like clearly has a lot to do with that.

In military operations, jet aircraft are the most intense source of both greenhouse-gas emissions and noise pollution. Jets account for almost 80% of the military’s fuel consumption. Their noise output is not as precisely quantified, but recent research in a study on civilian impacts around Naval Air Station Whidbey Island in Washington State found that, in the county where the base is located, two-thirds of the resident population were exposed to noise levels that could have negative health effects. One-fifth suffered high levels of annoyance and 9% were “highly sleep disturbed.” Worse yet, according to that study, “the Swinomish Indian Tribal Community of the Swinomish Reservation [located northeast of the airfield] was extremely vulnerable to health risks, with nearly 85 percent of residents being exposed.”

In Salina, Kansas, where Priti Gulati Cox and I live, we have less frequent but highly immersive experiences with military noise pollution every time the curiously named “Jaded Thunder joint exercise” comes to town. In part of that “exercise,” pilots from the Air Force, Army, Marines, and Navy take off from a nearby airfield in fighter jets and fly low over our city of 50,000. The noise hits you suddenly, like a roundhouse punch. It’s like nothing I’ve heard or felt elsewhere.  My own reaction to such overwhelming noise levels is similar to those found in survey responses from several residents of Madison, Wisconsin, who hear fighter jet noise much more routinely than we Salinans do. As one of them put it: “Everything I’m doing comes to a halt… my entire body tenses up and my heart starts racing… utterly jarring… impossible to make out dialogue… impossible to just continue any activity… reminds me of every innocent soul killed in a bombing by my home country.” Finally, there was simply this: “Annoyed.”

Cooler Means Quieter

America was getting louder before the rise of data centers, but now it’s getting louder faster. Unfortunately, the research on that is sparse, but it’s still a reasonable conclusion to draw. In her article, Bianca Bosker pointed out another intriguing indicator of our rising noise problem. Fire-engine sirens today are designed to be more than twice as loud as those of the 1970s, just so they’ll be audible above the rising din of our cities and suburbs. And keep in mind that they’re eight times as loud as the sirens of 1912.

Climate mitigation is also noise mitigation. To avoid baking the Earth, governments must quickly phase out the use of oil, gas, and coal. With a slimmed-down energy supply, economies will need to direct fuels and electricity toward uses that meet more essential needs. Crypto and AI are not among such uses, nor can we afford to keep streets and highways crammed with gas- and diesel-guzzling private vehicles. For those and many other reasons, count on one thing: strong efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions will also have striking beneficial side effects, including more peace and quiet. And that should be music to our ears. 

Copyright 2024 Stan Cox

via Tomdispatch.com

(The Conversation) – China-Africa relations have deepened over the past two decades, characterised by increased economic cooperation, investment and infrastructure development. China is now Africa’s largest trading partner, with partnerships focused on building roads, railways and energy projects.

As the ninth Forum on China–Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) kicks off this week in Beijing, a new, green theme is shaping their relationship: the global renewable energy race.

We asked Lauren Johnston, a development economist with expertise in China-Africa relations, to provide some insights into this development as it positions both regions as key players in the global shift towards green energy.

How is the race for green energy shaping relations between China and Africa?

The global climate crisis has created a push for renewable energy technology – like solar or wind power – which would lessen reliance on polluting energy sources. China saw some years ago it had a chance to lead in such a new industry.

Africa is home to a lot of the important minerals needed to create renewable technologies – like copper, cobalt and lithium, key ingredients in battery manufacture.

The race for green energy is therefore leading to a rush for these minerals in Africa, led by China, the US and Europe.

Chinese mining presence in Africa, which is much lower than western presence, is concentrated in five countries: Guinea, Zambia, South Africa, Zimbabwe, and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

Among them, the DRC, Zambia and Zimbabwe are the crucible of the new green energy race in Africa. They are home to Africa’s copper belt and the greatest store of lithium, copper and cobalt.

The DRC is particularly important. It has significant reserves of cobalt and high grade copper, as well as lithium. Cobalt is an unusually hard metal with a high melting point and magnetic properties. It is a key ingredient in lithium batteries.

More than 70% of the world’s cobalt is produced in the DRC and 15%-30% of that is produced by artisanal (informal) and small-scale mining.

China is the leading foreign investor – it owns some 72% of the DRC’s active cobalt and copper mines, including the Tenke Fungurume Mine – the world’s fifth largest copper mine and the world’s second largest cobalt mine.

China’s CMOC Group is the world’s leading cobalt mining company. It could produce up to 70,000 tonnes, thanks to the new Kisanfu mine.

In 2019, the DRC and China were responsible for about 70% of global production of cobalt and 60% of rare earths.

Zimbabwe is another country in which China has been investing within the context of the green energy race. Zimbabwe is home to Africa’s largest lithium reserves, a critical element in electric-vehicle battery production. In 2023 Prospect Lithium Zimbabwe, a subsidiary of Chinese company Zhejiang Huayou Cobalt, opened a US$300 million lithium processing plant. It has capacity to process 4.5 million tonnes a year of hard rock lithium into concentrate for export, against a global backdrop of some 200 million tonnes produced annually.

Digital, Midjourney, PS Express, 2024

There are a couple of other developments on the continent that are worth watching.

China is investing in the first mega-scale battery factory on the continent, in Morocco.

Chinese interests also have permission to develop the world’s largest untapped high-grade iron ore deposit, in Guinea. Iron ore, used in steel production, plays a crucial part in the renewable energy sector in several ways – for instance, steel is used in wind turbines and in mounting structures for solar panels. The agreement to exploit the Simandou iron ore deposit involves various countries. China’s steel-making giant Chinalco is among the players. Production is due to begin in early 2026.

As China ramps up investments in these green minerals, what concerns exist for African countries?

China’s growing control over key renewables minerals brings several challenges to African minerals suppliers.

For African countries it generates concerns for development – many want to add value to their minerals endowment at home rather than export raw materials to China and then import manufactures. China has been criticised for abandoning African interests by adding value in China and not in Africa. Many people and industries on the African continent lack access to reliable and affordable energy – and local industry is keen to capture that market.

For instance, according to the International Energy Agency, China controls over 80% of the global manufacturing steps involved in making solar panels. The concentration of production in China, alongside competition, has pushed down global solar panel prices.

China’s solar industry is keen to close Africa’s energy gap, providing sustainable energy to the millions that don’t have access. For instance, at this year’s Forum on China–Africa Cooperation gathering, China is expected to advance its Africa Solar Belt Programme. This is an agenda supported by the World Resources Institute which not only seeks to use solar energy to close Africa’s energy gap, but also to focus on powering schools and healthcare facilities with solar too.

Some countries, like South Africa, are pushing back by imposing tariffs on solar imports to protect their local industries.

There are also fears that the race to renewables, and the approach of Chinese mining-sector firms in Africa, is setting back workers’ conditions. Expansion of mines in some countries has also led to forced evictions and human rights abuses.

What can African countries do differently to take advantage of China’s mineral rush?

There are several steps they can take.

First, they can pay more attention to basic labour standards and human rights.

Second, African firms should aim to learn from their Chinese partners. They can develop the industrial knowledge and understanding of the skills and capabilities needed on the continent, similar to how China learned from Japanese, Taiwanese, Singaporean and western companies in the past.

Third, learn from how other emerging markets manage their relations with China. For instance, with China’s help, Indonesia has taken control of the global nickel market. Indonesia started by banning nickel exports in 2014, aiming to build up its own industries for processing and manufacturing. This plan was supported by Chinese investments.

Lastly, what I call China’s Hunan Model for Africa has a focus on agriculture, mining, transport and construction industries, and on building talent. This includes technical and vocational training.

The more African nations position themselves to take advantage of training programmes from other countries, the better their young people will be prepared to drive industrial growth and economic development in Africa.

Lauren Johnston, Associate Professor, China Studies Centre, University of Sydney

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Winter is ending in Australia, but it is worrisome that their August was among the hottest on record this year, presaging a hot dry summer to come, and raising the real risk of further massive bush fires of the sort that scorched the countryside and killed billions of animals in 2019-2020. The continent-country is highly vulnerable to climate change, with its two largest cities, Sydney and Melbourne, right on the sea and facing coastal erosion from sea level rise. It is unfortunate that so many Australian politicians and firms have found it so difficult to let go of coal and fossil gas. Although Australia is a relatively small country, the emissions of which are not all that consequential, it just sets a poor example for the rest of the world, especially for developing countries, if a very vulnerable country like Australia is a big coal user. How can it scold China and India for using so much coal, which really is consequential for the fate of the world, if Canberra is itself so irresponsible?

Although Australia has had a love affair with coal, the dirtiest and unhealthiest of the fossil fuels, even that addiction is beginning to subside. Less that 50% of the country’s electricity now comes from coal, an unprecedented development. Obviously, not all the states are as environmentally conscious and ambitious as South Australia.

Western Australia and the Northern Territory are particularly bad actors, actually expanding their use of coal and fossil gas.

Some other states have made great strides and have ambitious goals. South Australia has gone in big on solar energy and has largely dumped coal, and is employing batteries to store and use the solar energy when it is needed at night and at usage peaks during the day. The state wants to have all its electricity come from renewables by 2027, in only three years. And it is a highly plausible plan. Already, 70% of the electricity in South Australia comes from renewables, the best record of any large state by far, though the small Australian Capital Territory in which the capital of Canberra nestles has reached 100% renewable electricity generation and in Tasmania it is 98.2%. South Australia is lightly populated, but some of the more populous states are beginning to make strides as well.

In the country as a whole, there is good news. Since 2018, Australia has doubled the share of renewables in its electricity grid, and much of this increase in clean electricity has been spearheaded by states and territories rather than the federal government.

With a population of 26 million (a little bigger than Florida, a little smaller than Texas), Australia has about 10 million households. A full 3.6 million of them, about 36 percent, have rooftop solar installations. Half of all households in Queensland now have panels on their roofs.

“Outback Solar,” Digital, Dream /Dreamworld v3 / Clip2Comic, 2024.

In the US, a country 13 times the size of Australia, only 4.5 million households have rooftop solar. To be at the same level as Australia, we’d need 47 million households with rooftop solar. Given how sunny it is in the US south and southwest, it is crazy that we don’t have more, but conservative state legislatures in the back pocket of Big Carbon have often legislated obstacles. Australia’s homeowners clearly have managed to outmaneuver the Coal Lobby there. (We have solar panels and even in Michigan they much reduce our bill most of the year.)

The most populous Australia state, New South Wales, with over 8 million people, has made some strides in renewables. Some 35.6% of its electricity is from renewables, and 34% of its households have rooftop solar. 13% of its travel uses shared transportation, and there is an uptick in purchases of electric vehicles, though the absolute numbers remain small. NSW has banned offshore drilling and mining for fossil fuels.

South Australia, despite its thin population, is a technological leader in renewables. Not only do renewables supply 74.4% of electricity, but it has large battery projects that allow sunshine to be captured and used at night and at peak hours. The state hopes to phase out gas electricity plants in only a few years.

Batteries have also been key to California’s remarkable uptake of renewables.

Now Australia as a whole has six enormous battery projects in the pipeline.

At $1.7 trillion, Australia has the 13th largest GDP in the world. If the G20 states can get to carbon zero by 2050, that will solve the bulk of our climate worries, since all the carbon dioxide pumped into the atmosphere since the industrial revolution will be absorbed by the oceans over time. The temperature will immediately stop rising and will decline over time. If we go on spewing greenhouse gases into the atmosphere after 2050, however, we will outrun the capacity of the oceans to absorb them, and the world will get very hot, and the climate could go chaotic.

I hate to get wonky in the midst of this feel-good moment, but elections are about policy. Here I want to examine a specific policy, green energy and climate. Although Walz was not thought particularly good on green energy when he was in Congress, his record as governor of Minnesota has shown real successes in these regards. I went through Uni Nexis and distilled these items from Targeted New Service on his record, which seems to me impressive.

On September 16, 2019, Gov. Tim Walz announced clean car standards in Minnesota, according to Targeted News Service. He instructed his Administration to enforce a pair of clean vehicle regulations aimed at cutting down automobile emissions in the state. The low-emission vehicle (LEV) regulation mandated that car manufacturers offer passenger cars, trucks, and SUVs with reduced greenhouse gas emissions for the Minnesota market. Meanwhile, the zero-emission vehicle (ZEV) regulation compelled automakers to provide a greater number of vehicles with minimal or no tailpipe emissions for sale in the state, such as electric vehicles (EVs) and plug-in hybrids. Initial forecasts suggested that together, these two initiatives likely will have decreased yearly greenhouse gas emissions by two million tons by 2030. Walz remarked in this connection, slamming the pro-carbon then-President Trump “Climate change threatens the very things that make Minnesota a great place to live, from our magnificent 10,000 lakes to our farmable land and clean air. If Washington won’t lead on climate, Minnesota will. That is why we are taking bold action to reduce carbon emissions in a way that increases car options, protects public health, creates jobs, and saves Minnesotans money at the pump.”

On January 22, 2021, when Joe Biden had just come into the White House, Governor Tim Walz and Lieutenant Governor Peggy Flanagan unveiled a series of policy proposals aimed at achieving 100 percent clean electricity in Minnesota by 2040. These proposals expanded on Minnesota’s previous accomplishments in lowering reliance on fossil fuels and greater use of renewable energy to supply the state’s power needs. Walz said, “The time to fight climate change is now. Not only is clean energy the right and responsible choice for future generations, clean energy maximizes job creation and grows our economy, which is especially important as we work to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic. I am proud to announce a set of policy proposals that will lead Minnesota to 100% clean energy in the state’s electricity sector by 2040. Minnesotans have the ingenuity and innovation needed to power this future, and we are ready to pioneer the green energy economy.” (-Targeted News Service).

Note that 2040 is ten years before the Paris Climate Treaty’s deadline of 2050, so this was an ambitious climate plan.

On Jul 28, 2021 Targeted News Service reported that Walz and Lieutenant Governor Peggy Flanagan ceremonially affixed their signatures to the historic Energy Conservation and Optimization Act of 2021 (ECO Act). This legislation enhanced Minnesota’s energy-savings, diminished greenhouse gas emissions, and generated employment throughout the state. These jobs involved projects related to electricity, heating and cooling, ventilation, and insulation in residences and commercial establishments in Minnesota. Walz praised the bill for keeping Minnesota in the forefront of energy policy. The Act helped families improve the energy efficiency of their homes and expanded eligibility of low-income families for such aid. It created jobs in housing insulation, electrical wiring, ventilation and heating and cooling.

On Aug 12, 2021, a study was released by E2 (Environmental Entrepreneurs) and nonprofits Clean Energy Trust and Clean Energy Economy MN (CEEM) showing that in excess of 55,300 Minnesotans worked in “energy efficiency and clean energy” by the end of 2020. Walz observed of the bipartisan report, “By supporting the growth of clean energy jobs, we are not only boosting our economy, but also protecting our environment and Minnesota’s future. This report proves that we can have a clean future while creating jobs at the same time. Minnesota workers have the ingenuity and dedication needed to pioneer the green energy economy and bring us into the future.” (Targeted News Service.)

On August 18, 2022, Walz and Flanagan hailed the Biden Administration’s Inflation Reduction Act, which is actually green energy and climate legislation. Walz called it a “big win for Minnesota.” (Targeted News Service).

As of 2024, a third of Minnesota’s electricity now comes from wind, water, solar and biomass. The state added 600 megawatts of wind and solar this year.

Another 21% came from nuclear power, which is low-carbon, so 54%, a majority, of Minnesota’s electricity is now low-carbon. Coal-fired electricity has fallen dramatically to only 19%, with somewhat cleaner natural gas at 27%.

In just the past year, Minnesota’s emissions fell 10%. EV registrations, still limited, grew by 55% since last year.

These numbers are across the board better than those of the United States as a whole, which speaks well of Gov. Walz. It is to be hoped that he can bring his climate and green energy commitments to the national stage as vice president.

Notional, slightly inexact effort to depict the likely components of Minnesota electricity in summer 2024.

The IEA found that emissions from the advanced economies actually fell in 2023, although global emissions increased slightly, by 1.1%. The report says, “After falling by around 4.5% in 2023, emissions in advanced economies were lower than they were fifty years ago in 1973.”

Emissions have fallen in the advanced economies before, as with the 2020 COVID pandemic, the 2008-2009 deep recession, and during economic downturns in the 1970s and 1980s.

The reason the new findings are so heartening, however, is that in 2023 emissions from the advanced economies fell even though they experienced economic growth. A 4.5% fall in emissions from countries with an expanding GDP is unprecedented in the hydrocarbon era. The advanced economies grew by 1.7%.

The fall in emissions would have been even greater, but drought in China and elsewhere caused hydroelectric production to fall last year. This finding should reinforce for us how, the longer we leave the climate crisis unsolved, the harder it becomes to solve it.

This finding is a slap in the face to figures such as past COP chairman Sultan Ahmed al-Jaber of the United Arab Emirates. In a testy exchange with Mary Robinson, chair of the Elders, last fall, Al-Jaber said, “Please help me, show me the roadmap for a phase-out of fossil fuel that will allow for sustainable socioeconomic development, unless you want to take the world back into caves.”

Mr. Al-Jaber, meet the IEA. In 2023, the advanced economies grew and developed, but they cut their carbon dioxide production by over 4% nevertheless. And that is the future of the world. Petroleum will still have a value, for instance in petro-chemicals such as fertilizer, but it will increasingly not be burned for fuel to power vehicles.

Carbon dioxide emissions are produced in lots of ways, from burning gasoline in vehicles, from heating homes and businesses, and from electricity production. Some 2/3s of the reduction in CO2 last year took place in the electricity sector. This is a testament to the vast build-out in the US, Europe, and China, of wind and solar power. Renewables accounted for over a third of electricity generation in 2023.

At the same time, coal fell to only 17% of electricity production. Coal is the dirtiest fossil fuel and needs to be phased out entirely. Some coal was replaced instead by fossil gas, which isn’t as good, but still cuts CO2 emissions by half. Replacing coal with solar and wind would cut them to almost zero.

A piece of very good news is that coal use in the advanced economies has fallen to 1900 levels. That is still way too high– we need to get back to 1750 and drop coal entirely. But it is a remarkable accomplishment compared even to a decade ago.

The figures for Europe are even more striking. There, CO2 emissions were reduced by nearly 9% last year! These countries, however, experienced weaker growth than the average of the OECD, at 0.7%. In Europe, fully half of the decline of carbon dioxide output was owing to growth in clean energy.

One takeaway from the finding that emissions fell in advanced countries but still rose by a percentage point globally is that the wealthier nations must now increasingly invest in green energy in the developing world. The climate doesn’t care where you live. The moment we hit 2.7° F. above the preindustrial average, there is some reason to think that there will be an immediate big crop failure. Greening our global energy isn’t an abstract ideal. We have to do it to keep our children and grandchildren from starving or becoming climate refugees.

Featured Image: “Clean Air and Earth,” Digital, Dream/ Dreamland v. 3, 2024.

(The Conversation) – As the climate crisis escalates, there are urgent and difficult choices that need to be made to drastically reduce our carbon emissions before more irreparable damage is done.

Many have argued the energy industry needs to change to reduce carbon emissions, but one concern that remains is the consequence this will have on economic prosperity.

Discussions vary across interest groups. Do we need to outright replace the fossil fuel industry with the renewable energy industry as soon as possible? Should we slowly phase out fossil fuels while making clean renewable replacements? Or, should we continue with a powerful fossil fuel industry while separately growing a renewable industry in parallel?

How these different choices could impact our economies seems unclear, and it is this lack of clarity that opens up the field for frustrating discussions. At the recent COP28 climate summit in the United Arab Emirates, the conference president shockingly said that there is “no science” behind any decision to phase-out fossil fuels from our energy systems — a statement which he later claimed was “misinterpreted.”

My recent research examines energy industry restructuring options for a green transition to renewable energy from an economic perspective.

Although economic analysis is helpful, it is not sufficient on its own for making these important decisions. So, my research also draws on sustainability which involves considering the conditions faced by future generations, and a concept known as equifinality reminding us to keep our minds open to many possible approaches that may satisfy the same objectives.

Renewable energy innovation and GDP

My research indicates that renewable energy innovation contributes to higher GDP. Contrary to some commonly held beliefs, a clean transition is, and has been for at least a decade, good for the economy — even in earlier stages of its development.

My findings also suggest that government and industry support for the fossil fuel industry negatively affects a country’s renewable energy innovation. The two industries are not compatible.

When the fossil fuel industry invests in itself, it also appears to improve GDP, which creates confusion about the best way to ensure economic prosperity while transitioning to clean energy.

Image by Jukka Niittymaa from Pixabay

But this investment, often made through lobbying, only prolongs the existence of the fossil fuel industry by keeping renewable energy competition out. This creates a false dichotomy between reducing emissions and improving GDP when, in fact, clean innovation can achieve both simultaneously.

My research indicates that clean innovation makes a stronger economy and reduces emissions. If we want to reinforce that dual progress, rather than accepting trade-offs, then we have to stop supporting the fossil fuel industry which aims to slow it down.

Helping renewable energy thrive

Economically speaking, the fossil fuel industry is negatively impacting consumer welfare by maintaining higher-than-necessary prices due to limited competition. This, in turn, bumps up GDP through inflated profits, having subsidised an already dominant polluting industry, reducing clean innovation and delaying cleaner progress — obviously not the way to grow a healthy economy.

In fact, GDP is not a standard of living measure or a measure of innovative competitiveness. To address inflation and the cost of living crisis, we should be promoting more competition across industries. This is a more productive type of capitalism that brings wider benefits to all of us, including more innovation, lower prices, and better products for domestic and export markets.

Government subsidies that boost the fossil fuel industry hinder consumer welfare and the transition to clean energy. Some examples include subsidies to fund more carbon capture and storage technology and the use of fossil energy in hydrogen storage systems.

Instead of funding these backward subsidies, governments should implement pollution taxes while also supporting renewable energy innovation.

My research demonstrates that pollution taxes work well with clean innovation capabilities. Supporting research and innovation in renewable energy and using a carbon tax as a tool can boost the economic benefits of transitioning to clean energy.

The findings of my work suggest that a robust economy is related to industry restructuring so that renewable energy innovation can thrive. Fostering novel scientific discoveries in clean energy innovation should be prioritized while reducing non-competitive industry formations and organizations, such as fossil fuel oligopolies and industry associations.

Making decisions with the future in mind

Increasing public awareness and understanding of fossil fuel industry games is a way to accelerate change. It’s important to recognize that industries at different life cycle stages contribute to the economy in different ways.

A newer rising industry with determined entrepreneurs, like that of renewable energy, invests in innovation to create value. On the other hand, a declining industry plays end-game strategies, like engaging in self-promotional activities, to maintain their existing position and create barriers to new industry entries.

However, consumer welfare increases with competition, not collusion. Economic analysis is not sufficient on its own for decision-making in this area because positive economic outcomes can be generated by different kinds of strategies supporting an industry’s life cycle goals.

Government policy decisions should be made based on economic analyses alongside broader sustainability criteria. Ignoring the equifinality argument and reverting to discussions about replacing coal with gas as a bridge only ensures fossil fuels remain in use for at least another generation of infrastructure.

Communities should apply sustainability and equifinality lenses to decision-making, understanding that there are many possible means to an end. For example, if a community has specific concerns about one type of renewable energy system, they should explore other alternative clean energy options instead of defaulting to fossil fuels.

An educated public should reject simplistic and single-sided arguments and understand there are usually more nuanced solutions to problems supported by evidence-based analysis. By embracing a more holistic approach, we can develop more sustainable societies by opening up renewable energy possibilities.

Deborah de Lange, Associate Professor, Global Management Studies, Toronto Metropolitan University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.