Mêlant allégrement Sciences et Science Fictions – le livre idéal des Utopiales – l’introduction démonte les visions futuristiques de fuite en avant technologique et de conquêtes spatiales de Musk et consorts qui sont tant irréalistes que futiles. Peut-on vraiment aller sur la Lune et Mars ? Et si on peut y aller, devrait-on ? Coloniser le système solaire et extraire des astéroides les métaux dont on a besoin ? On y observe un bref caméo de Roland Lehoucq, astrophysicien au Commissariat à l’Energie Atomique et Président des Utopiales sur ce sujet.

Dans “Ressources…” on suit les auteurs dans un exercice de pensée qui questionne profondément sur la croissance sans fin de nos économies ainsi que notre appétit dévorant de ressources de tous types. Le livre se compose en 7 chapitres distincts :
1. Les cornucopiens (cf la corne d’abondance)
2. L’exponentielle
3. Les ressources
4. De Gaïa à Thanatia
5. Le recyclage
6. Une civilisation technologiquement soutenable
7. Le vaisseau fou

Un autre monde est-il possible ? Si tant mon écriture que ma carrière m’ont amené à me pencher et à travailler sur les questions de transition énergétique et du changement climatique et la suffisance en ressources de base. très peu sur le changement climatique mais plus sur la consommation des ressources, notamment celles qui ont un impact gigantesque malgré leur faibles quantités : les métaux, les terres rares, ceux très rares. l’assemblage technologique de nos smartphones, télés et autres laptops est un vrai problème pour le recyclage. Pourra t’on vraiment recycler un jour ces merveilles technologiques ? En attendant, vive le low tech !

Les auteurs plaident pour le low tech et pour le retour de la parcimonie, de la suffisance, de la tempérance – valeur cardinale de nombreuses sociétés, religions et cultures, notamment en Grèce Antique ou du Bouddhisme. C’est le pendant technologique et matérialiste de la sobriété energétique que de nombreux professionnels de la transition énergétique plaident.

Avons-nous vraiment besoin de changer de téléphone tous les deux ans ? De nouveaux ordinateurs ou aspirateurs tous les cinq ? Il nous faut collectivement renoncer aux sirènes du marketing et inventer un nouveau monde. Le but du livre et de réinventer le monde et notre rapport avec celui-ci.

Quel est le but de notre société ? Est ce d’avoir toujours plus et ainsi tuer le reste de la biosphère et participer à l’effondrement de nos sociétés et des millions d’espèces végétales et animales dont nous dépendons ? Ou est ce de ralentir, réfléchir et ainsi retrouver un lien avec la Nature ? C’est ainsi un complément idéal du livre de Timothée Parrique, Ralentir ou Périr (dont je publierai un jour la critique ici même).

Sous ces airs de roman graphique avec de nombreuses images de science fiction, Ressources, un défi pour l’humanité nous offre l’occasion d’une profonde remise en question.

Les fameux limites à la croissance du Club de Rome paru dans les 1970, époque où l’électroménager et les équipements en général étaient encore pensés et construits pour être utilisés pendant des décennies.

Conclusion : ce livre est à la fois une leçon d’histoire que de technologie et d’économie, le tout exécuté avec maestria et brio. Ce roman graphique est à faire lire et relire par tout un chacun.e, en particulier par tous celles et ceux qui veulent contruire un monde meilleur, différent.

This means that by the end of the decade, Earth will be on track to breach – and stay beyond – the threshold of the Paris Agreement (2015) with 1.5°C of warming above pre-industrial levels.

As Time Magazine notes, all ten of the hottest years on record have been since 2015, with 2024 already beating the 1.5°C limit. Stopping and reversing climate change will get harder and harder the longer we wait. It will even become impossible at some point with emissions being locked in with positive feedback loops and tipping points.

Below is a graph French climate scientist Serge Zaka published on social media. It is quite evident pointed out this way : climate change IS indeed accelerating.

It is not as if we were not seeing it coming. The long documented consequences of a warming climate are hitting us all harder each year. From rising sea levels and coastal erosion to extreme weather events that are increasing in both intensity and frequency.

After over 20 years of reading and writing about these topics, I admit I have lost faith in Humanity to adress meaningfuly this crisis, and to be honest, any of our major crises (biodiversity erosion, rising inequalities…)

Yes, renewables are now being adopted globally at an exponential rate. Yes, batteries have the potential to store massive amounts of clean electricity around the world. These are good news and we should rejoice. And we should acknowledge that this is nowhere near enough to actually drive a dent into our increasing emissions : 2025 will most likely be yet another year for record emissions as Carbon Brief pointed out.

Indeed, electrification is lagging in both the European Union and North America. Nor are we are anywhere near building systems or societies that change pace or goals towards actual sustainability…

Will anything positive comes out of the latest war in the Middle East ? Will the world’s leaders actually wake up and implement the changes most of people want ? Only time will tell. Either way I will keep on reporting.

En France

Selon l’Ademe (Agence de la Transition Energétique), l’éclairage public représente 47% de la consommation d’électricité des collectivités. En effet, il y a actuellement entre 11 et 12 millions de points lumineux sur l’ensemble du pays, soit un lampadaire pour six habitants environ. Ce chiffre continue de croître à cause de l’étalement urbain. Au niveau électrique, la puissance appelée est de l’ordre de 1 300 Mégawatts (soit la puissance d’un réacteur nucléaire comme ceux installés à Cattenom).

De nos jours, l’éclairage urbain représente environ 3 à 4 TWh / an, sur les 440-460 TWh consommés en France chaque année (1 TWh = 1 million de MWh ou 1 milliard de kWh). Ce chiffre a baissé : entre 2000 et 2012, on était plutôt sur 5,5 à 6 TWh. Cette baisse des consommations a été réalisée grâce à d’importantes économies d’énergie.

Mais, à 20 centimes d’euros du kWh, cela représente près de 600 à 800 millions d’euros par an. Ce à quoi il faut ajouter l’entretien, la maintenance, etc, le coût annuel de l’éclairage public est environ 2 milliards d’euros par an à la France.

Or, si on estime à 50% la lumière « perdue », il y a pour la France un milliard d’euros à économiser… Au niveau des émissions de gaz à effet de serre cela représente selon l’ADEME 670 000 tonnes de CO2 rien que pour notre pays. Ce sont des chiffres à garder en tête à l’heure ou nous nous apprêtons à voter pour les élections municipales, d’autant plus avec cette énième guerre qui débute au Moyen Orient.

En Europe

L’argent gaspillé pour cause de la pollution lumineuse pour l’Union Européenne est estimée à 5,2 Mds d’euros, soit plus de 10€ par personne et par an… La France n’est pas la seule à avoir un arsenal législatif pour lutter contre ce problème. L’Italie, la Croatie et la Slovénie ont des lois aussi pour endiguer le phénomène (source). On peut également mentionner le Manifeste Européen contre la pollution lumineuse lancé par l’Espagne lors de sa présidence du Conseil de l’Europe en 2023.

Dans le reste du monde

Selon l’association Dark Sky, on parle de 250 TWh de consommation pour l’éclairage nocturne extérieur en pure perte. C’est quasi deux fois plus que ce que consomme la France en une année (440 TWh). Au niveau mondial, cela équivaut à 50 milliards de Dollars US en pure perte.

Toujours selon cette association, les Etats-Unis pourraient économiser 15 milliards de Dollars US par an d’ici à 2035 en passant à un éclairage raisonné (extinction, détection de mouvements, etc) + passage à la technologie LED. Au niveau mondial, l’association estime qu’un pourcent des émissions de gaz à effet de serre au niveau mondial est du à « l’éclairage qui s’enfuit dans l’espace »

Je reviendrai le mois prochain sur les différents moyens de limiter la pollution lumineuse. Pour cela et bien plus encore, gardez le contact et abonnez vous soit au blog soit sur les réseaux sociaux !

Credits images : Agence Spatiale Européenne (ESA), Londres de nuit.

After over 20 years of commitment to sustainability and renewable energy, I am convinced that – aided with significant gains in energy efficiency, conservation and sobriety – a post fossil fuels world could be within reach in the coming decades. This is actually an imperative if we are to tackle climate change and its many adverse impacts on human health and societies.

We have seen it time and again : our economies are built on wasting key resources and gross inefficiencies. For example, one thinks of the 80% inefficiency of the internal combustion engines that power our vehicles and the 60 to 65% inefficiency of coal, gas or nuclear plants.

The efforts to decarbonize and electrify our societies are so worth it.

• With less or no coal, fossil gas and oil being burnt anymore, our cities and communities will have much lower local air pollution. This is something to remember as over 8 million people die because of air pollution every year. That’s 22,000 each day ! (Source : UNICEF).
  
• Every year, global warming causes billions of dollars worth of damages in increasingly horrible disasters. According to Climate Central,“2025 ranks as the third-highest year (after 2023 and 2024) for billion-dollar weather and climate disasters — with 23 such events costing a total of $115 billion in damages.” This could stop getting worse and worse if we act adequately.
  
• 40 percent of naval shipping globally is just for coal, gas and oil. Data from UNCTAD shows that “when the tonnages for coal, oil, gas and petrochemicals are summed up, they constitute nearly 4,500 million tons out of the 11,000 million tons of total maritime shipping.” Let us all switch to renewables and efficiency and all these boats and their pollution would disappear.
  
• Last but not least, in a post fossil fuels world, many autocrats and dictators will have drastically less money to spend on threatening world peace, invading their neighbors or bribing politicians in far away places. This alone could be a game changer for Europe and the rest of the world as well.

You might say I am a dreamer but I am not the only one. And this is actually pragmatic : not ending our over reliance on fossil fuels means runaway climate change. Our current systems will end and our societies will change, one way or another : Through choice and hard work or through catastrophes. Our relative inaction in the past decades show all too clearly what is at stake.

In most if not all cases, we already have the technology to turn the situation on its head. For example :

• The mighty heat pump : with 1 unit of electricity, one can produce 3 to 4 times more heat or cold. This can have massive implications for how we heat or cool our homes and neighborhoods and how we generate low grade heat for industrial applications.
• In conjunction with electric cars, more bikes and electric buses would mean more space for Nature and people alike. With more trains replacing planes we would all suffer much less from noise and stress in our cities.
• Halving the global food waste and turning the remaining stuff into biogas for cogeneration can be another massive win for our societies as decaying food and organic matter are a massive source of methane, a potent greenhouse gas.

You see, I do look forward to a post fossil fuels world. We have so many ways to act on climate, so much to win and so much to lose. Fortunately, some critical elements are trending towards the right direction. This will be the subject of a next article, so stay tuned for more !

Image credits : Ehimetalor Akhere Unuabona on Unsplash

En tant que professionnel de la transition énergétique passionné par l’astronomie commençant l’astrophotographie, ce sujet se trouve au centre de nombreux de mes préoccupations et passe-temps.

Cette thématique est véritablement systémique et coûte des milliards d’euros chaque année. Ce qui nécessite une véritable réflexion de par les nombreux problèmes qu’elle pose pour nos sociétés et notre environnement.

A l’heure actuelle, un tiers de l’humanité – environ 2,5 milliards de personnes – ne peut plus voir la Voie Lactée à cause de la pollution lumineuse. Dans l’Union Européenne, ce chiffre atteint les 60%. Aux États-Unis, c’est 80 % de la population. En France, selon le gouvernement, 85 % du territoire métropolitain est exposé à un niveau élevé de pollution lumineuse.

Tout cela a des répercussions significatives non seulement sur notre capacité à observer les étoiles mais aussi sur la santé des êtres humains, des animaux et des plantes mais aussi sur nos économies et nos sociétés.

Selon Eric Lagadec, astrophysicien à l’Observatoire de la Côte d’Azur, sur Bluesky :

Pour conclure cette introduction : comme on le verra dans cette série d’articles, la pollution lumineuse représente 1. une vraie pollution qui coute très cher ; 2. un problème qui nous empoisonne et nous rend malades ; 3. qui nous empêche de voir les étoiles ; 4. qui nuit aussi à la faune, à la flore ;5. contre laquelle les gens veulent lutter et 6. contre laquelle on a un arsenal législatif à appliquer.

Face à tous ces impacts négatifs, qu’attend t’on pour agir ? A l’heure des élections municipales qui approchent, voici un (autre) sujet qui ne manquera pas de faire parler lors des réunions électorales. Je vous donne rendez-vous le mois prochain pour le deuxième article. On y parlera argent.

Credits image : capture www.lightpollutionmap.info

I find this speech brilliant. It starts by reminding the audience of the Meadows report. (also called Limits to Growth, all the way back to 1972). Then it pursues by stating that keeping on business-as-usual will only lead to resource scarcity, systems collapse or both as we can’t have infinite growth on a finite system (called Earth).

The author then mentions the crude reality, with 7 of 9 planetary boundaries have been breached. If this is something I had mentioned previously, I didn’t know that the 15% wealthiest of the global population consumes as much as the rest. This shows how privileged and even wasteful the richest 1.2 billion people are.

The presentation continues, stating that for a while, the consensus was that taxing pollution, investing in clean tech and innovation would be enough to result in green growth and that all our problems would then be solved. And, unless you have slept in a cave for the past 15 years, you know this didn’t happen and that we still need to get global greenhouse gases emissions to actually drop, and fast.

This is already a daunting task as it is. AND, there are all the other boundaries to take care of. “Solving” climate change alone won’t deal with everything else. Hence the image of the giant Rubicks cube that needs solving with six issues : climate, soil, oceans, pollution, biodiversity, water and climate. As we have seen, technology is only a fraction of the solution, and only a small part of it.

Hence the three elements explained afterwards by Timothée Parrique :

Scale (also called minimalism, degrowth,…) is about going for sufficiency. Keeping our precious resources for what truly matters ;

Under, composition are elements such as eating less meat, travelling using less energy intensive means… For energy, it’s going from fossil fuels to renewables. This is all about adequacy ;

Efficiency : we don’t need to innovate any more on technology but on how we use it. We should be promoting well-being as an alternative goal to GDP – something am well aware of since I wrote about it years ago while doing my MBA in Sustainable Business and Energy.

With so many intricate problems, sustainability and energy transition professionals know that this will require complex thinking. In the end, Parrique believes that Less + Different + Better can help us move from isolated gestures to systemic change, with each steps unlocks the next one.

To end this article, I believe this is an absolute must watch for sustainability professionals and concerned citizens wherever they are. The old world is dying indeed. What the world of tomorrow will be is up to each and everyone of us. This is up to us all.

Ainsi que deux ateliers l’après-midi :
• Autoconsommation collective : vers une montée en puissance ?
• Le grand stockage : une solution pour soutenir un réseau en transition

Alors que 5 à 6 Gigawatts-crète (GWc) de solaire PV sont installés dans notre beau chaque année ces dernières années – permettant l’équivalent de la production annuelle d’électricité d’un réacteur nucléaire – cet évènement était l’occasion de revenir sur les importantes incertitudes qui subsistent pour l’ensemble du secteur. Le solaire photovoltaïque représente des dizaines de milliers d’emplois de toutes sortes tant dans les villes que dans nos campagnes et des millions d’euros de chiffres d’affaire annuel.

L’adoption officielle de la Programmation Pluriannuelle de l’Energie (PPE 3) se fait toujours attendre alors que le gouvernement semble ne pas pleinement comprendre l’enjeu que celle-ci représente pour le pays, ses centaines de milliers de professionnels du secteur énergétique et les dizaines de millions de consommateurs.

Les énergies renouvelables (ENR) représentent maintenant près d’un tiers de la consommation d’électricité française. Le potentiel solaire dans notre beau pays est énorme mais il est urgent de savoir à quoi pourrait servir toute cette électricité bas carbone et à bas cout. Alors que la France a importé pour 67 milliards d’euros en gaz et pétrole l’an dernier, il faut augmenter rapidement les capacités d’ENR sur notre réseau électrique et électrifier de façon urgente nos usages, notamment :

• Massifier l’usage des pompes à chaleur tant pour les logements individuels que pour les immeubles de bureau, les hôpitaux, et même des quartiers entiers (en combinant ceci à une isolation thermique, mais c’est un autre sujet) ;
• Accélérer le recours aux véhicules électriques, pas seulement la voiture individuelle, mais aussi les bus, les camions… Là aussi le potentiel d’emplois à créer est gigantesque, surtout si on compte sur le rétrofit de véhicules existants ;
• Réindustrialiser le pays. De nombreux process peuvent bénéficier de l’électrification, pour preuve cet article des Echos relatant qu’ArcelorMittal va investir 1.3 milliard d’euros pour électrifier sa production d’acier à Dunkerque, dans le Nord de la France.

Il faut selon moi également diversifier et multiplier les orientations et inclinaisons des installations afin de produire plus d’électricité d’origine solaire en début de matinée et en fin d’après-midi. Ceci nous permettrait d’avoir de l’électricité très compétitive toute au long de la journée et nous permettrait de nous débarrasser de la “duck curve” ( ou courbe en canard) sans avoir recours a d’importantes quantités de batteries.

Celles-ci étaient au sujet de la dernière partie de la journée de ces rencontres solaires de l’Est. Grâce aux prix de ces technologies qui ont chuté de 60 % ces deux dernières années, de nombreux pays et régions du globe installent d’importantes capacités de stockage d’électricité : Californie, Australie, Italie…

Pendant ce temps, la France reste là encore en retard sur ce sujet crucial qui lui permettrait de stocker demain les surplus d’électricité d’origine solaire, photovoltaïque ou bien même nucléaire… et ainsi faire chuter les couts de l’électricité.

Pour conclure, l’autoconsommation tant individuelle que collective apparait comme une réponse à d’importantes problématiques de couts de résilience et de souveraineté économique. Et si demain nos communes et collectivités produisaient elles-mêmes une part de leur électricité ? Ce sont des perspectives fort intéressantes et réjouissantes.

A quote is making the rounds in “The old world is dying, and the new world struggles to be born; now is the time of monsters.” by Antonio Gramsci. This sure looks like it. 2019 was the the last normal looking year and a lot of things are looking bleak.

Yet,there are many reasons to remain hopeful. The global energy transition may slow down in some parts but it will continue in the majority of places. China, India, most nations are still acceelerating in their adoption of cleantech. The European Union is continuing its move towards less coal and gas and more solar and wind.

Electric cars are keeping on booming, much to the dismay of Big Oil. This is a mortal danger for Exxon and the likes as less oil in ground transportation means less billions for them to invest in destabilizing our societies.

The electrification of our industries will hopefully continue and accelerate and we need to make our economies more circular. The challenges are numerous. I will get back to all that in the next few weeks.

Instead of going all in globally on making our world more sustainable and more peaceful, the past few years have gone in the exact opposite direction. It may feel hopeless, but that is exactly what the people in charge want you to be. Abandoning all hope would let them win. So more than ever, another world is possible : let’s push on !

But as we will see in the next few weeks with the upcoming posts, a lot of positive change is taking place. To make sure you don’t miss any of these, please subscribe or follow me on Linkedin, Bluesky and other social media.

Image credits : Logan Voss on Unsplash.

Six years ago he and his wife bought a new Tesla Model 3 -a model he describes as reliable, safe and with good performance – and since then drove 100,000 miles with it. Long story short, the estimated saving on fuel costs alone are 13,200 GBP / 15,000€ / 17,400 USD for just a 100 000 miles / 160 000 kms. That’s right, going electric helped them save 13 pennies per mile (or 9 euro cents per kilometer / 17 US cent per mile ). This is just insane.

This video is a perfect reminder that in general, cars cost a lot, especially over a long period : 35 000 GBP in their case, with a total of 15 000 GBP saved when accounting for running costs, depreciation and so on.

The comment section, for once, does not dissapoint and offers tons of other people experiencing what is “crude” reality for fossil fuels companies : electric vehicles are just a lot better, more efficient, more reliable, and thus much cheaper to run than “regular” gas or diesel cars.

Electric engines have much less parts than internal combustion ones. This makes maintenance and eventual repair easier and cheaper. With the advent of cheap solar pv – and in more and more countries, the obligation to cover parking lots with solar canopies – the future is electric.

Now, without further ado, here is the video :

To conclude, this doesn’t mean that private cars should be the be all and end all. Congestion will still be a problem if we swap our millions of polluting cars running on cas to the same number of electric cars. In cities, we need many more alternatives such as reliable public transportation and protected bike lanes. Between cities we need more high speed trains.

Image credits : Alexander Mils on Unsplash.

The Euro-Mediterranean Center on Climate Change (CMCC, from Italy) published a report in November reminding us all of the obvious :

” pursuing net-zero climate policies and avoiding temporary overshoot of the 1.5°C temperature limit could prevent 207,000 premature deaths and save $2,269 billion USD in economic damages by 2030 by improving air quality. “

“The research highlights that ambitious climate action not only limits global warming but also delivers immediate health and economic co-benefits, providing strong evidence for the importance of stringent mitigation policies worldwide.“

Please check out the press release for more details on how this would be particularly beneficial for countries with high population density and air pollution such as China and India.

Another study, this time from the Lancet provides further evidence that instead of backtracking on the meager stuff we have done to actually stop or slow down our climate from warming, we should double or triple down on action. As the World Economic Forum mentions :

“Rising temperatures have pushed 12 of 20 key indicators tracking health threats related to climate change to record levels in the past year, according to the 2025 Lancet Countdown report.

The findings explore how climate inaction is costing lives, straining health systems and undermining economies.

Higher temperatures have led to a 63% increase in heat-related deaths since the 1990s, with an estimated 546,000 average annual deaths from 2012 to 2021, meaning one person dies every minute from extreme heat.”

Other key findings include:

• 124 million people faced moderate or severe food insecurity in 2023 due to droughts and heatwaves.
• 640 billion labour hours were lost in 2024, with productivity losses equivalent to $1.09 trillion.
• $261 billion total costs of heat-related deaths among older adults.

“The climate crisis is a health crisis. Every fraction of a degree of warming costs lives and livelihoods,” 

What boggles the mind is that each new study for the past twenty or thirty years have amounted to the same message : yes, acting meaningfully on climate pays, not only in terms of money saved but also in terms of lives saved. If we were rational we would have embraced climate change mitigation even before I was born – in the 1980s – or when I was a teen and the first Conferences of Parties were taking place in the 1990s. Yet, here we are.

I would love to be wrong but I am not expecting anything from the UNFCC COP30 taking place in Brazil right now. Granted, the so-called Paris Accord have stallen greenhouse gases emissions growth and significant amounts of money have been invested in the global energy transition since, but all this is a far cry from rapid decrease of our greenhouse gases emissions we should be witnessing right now.

Solar, wind and other renewables are not replacing fossil fuels, and this despite their stratospheric growth. Our economic models are still base on consumerism and infinite growth. Will this change ? Will we embrace energy efficiency, conservation and sobriety (sufficiency) ?

• La récupération de chaleur (chaleur fatale) des process industriels, des eaux usées, des data centers ou de l’incinération des déchets… Le potentiel global est immense (voir plus bas) ;
• Les pompes à chaleur. Qu’elles utilisent l’eau ou l’air ambiant comme source ont un avenir radieux du fait de leur haut coefficient de performance. Une unité d’électricité pouvant générer trois ou quatre unités de chaleur ;
• La géothermie qu’elle soit sur nappe, sur lac ou de surface a aussi beaucoup d’avenir. Ces deux solutions ont l’avantage de pouvoir produire du chaud et du froid ;
• Le solaire thermique est une bonne source de chaleur, notamment pour l’eau chaude sanitaire. Certains pays comme le Danemark utilisent même cette solution pour des réseaux de chaleur alors qu’ils sont moins ensoleillés que le nôtre.

Comme le montre le graphique de l’ADEME ci-dessous, Le bois énergie ne vient ainsi qu’en tout dernier, une fois que toutes les alternatives ont été épuisées.

La chaleur fatale, kesaco ?

La chaleur de récupération, ou chaleur fatale, est l‘énergie thermique émise par un procédé dont elle n’est pas la finalité. Son exploitation demande le développement d’une technologie complémentaire. Il s’agit généralement d’améliorer à la fois l’efficacité énergétique et l’impact environnemental d’un système produisant, de manière annexe, de la chaleur.

Selon l’ADEME, « L’industrie présente un potentiel de chaleur fatale de 109,5 TWh, soit 36 % de sa consommation de combustibles, dont 52,9 TWh sont perdus à plus de 100°C. (Pour rappel : 1 TWh = 1 milliard de kWh ou 1 million de MWh).

À ce gisement s’ajoute 8,4 TWh de chaleur rejetés au niveau des Unité d’Incinération d’Ordures Ménagères (UIOM), les station de transfert d’énergie par pompage (STEP) et les Data Centers.

Par ailleurs, 16,7 TWh de chaleur fatale à plus de 60°C sont identifiés à proximité d’un réseau de chaleur existant. Ce potentiel représente un peu plus de 1,66 millions équivalents logements. ». Cependant il est à noter que l’électrification de l’industrie – si elle se fait un jour – pourrait diminuer fortement ces potentiels du fait qu’il n’y ait moins de chaleur fatale dans des processus électrifiés.

On l’a vu, les solutions pour compléter voire remplacer le bois énergie sont nombreuses. Nos communes et collectivités diversifient leurs apports de chaleur et ce n’est que le début.

Here are some quick news I gathered in the previous months :

Pakistan

Home to almost 250 million people, Pakistan has undergone a massive solar boom in the last few years. To a recent report by Ember, “The country imported 17 GW of solar panels in 2024 to meet this growing consumer demand, double the amount imported the year before. ” 17 GW of panels in just one year is enormous when one considers that France has installed 25 GW in approximately 20 years…

As a result of this staggering growth, solar pv is now the third electricity source, accounting for 14 percent of all electricity consumed in Pakistan, more than tripling its share in just three years. According to the local newspaper The Nation, ” Pakistan had become the sixth-largest solar market in the world due to its fast shift towards renewable energy.”

Iran

With a population of 88 million people, Iran is also going all in on solar, with close to 30 GW of capacity of new solar pv capacity permits earlier this year as The Tehran Times reported. This is done by the local government to close the electricity supply-demand gap and clean the air. This might be just the beginning as there are plans for a total of 50 GW in the coming years.

Africa

With 600 million people still without access to electricity, many an African nation might do for electricity what it did years ago with telephone and mobiles : skip the old technology and leapfrog to the 21st century altogether.

Solar seems a perfect fit as the continent receives the highest levels of solar irradiance, making photovoltaic’s potential almost unlimited as the African Development Bank notes. As CNN reported, the entire continent had a mere 21.5 GW of installed capacity last year. But this might change very fast as the continent imported 15 GW worth of solar PV panels last year alone.

And if solar PV panels kits and full installations may not become mainstream as fast as people want and need, in the meantime, solar lamps and gadgets help fill the gap. The Rocky Mountain Institute published an interesting report on this very topic.

This solar boom might not bust anytime soon as China is producing more and more panels and photovoltaic is just the perfect solution to help people access electricity, and with it, all the amenities of modern life. Be sure that I will keep on writing on this. So for this and for much more, stay tuned !

A major new scientific review, “Planetary Health Check 2025”, shows that seven of nine planetary boundaries have now been exceeded. For the first time, this also includes the boundary for ocean acidification.

This means that several of Earth’s life-supporting systems risk crossing critical thresholds, with severe consequences for both ecosystems and societies.

The seven breached planetary boundaries are: Climate Change, Biosphere Integrity, Land System Change, Freshwater Use, Biogeochemical Flows, Novel Entities, and Ocean Acidification (new in 2025). All of these seven boundaries show worsening trends.

Only Ozone Depletion and Aerosol Loading remain in the safe zone.

“We are witnessing widespread decline in the health of our planet. But this is not an inevitable outcome. The drop in aerosol pollution and healing of the ozone layer, shows that it is possible to turn the direction of global development. Even if the diagnosis is dire, the window of cure is still open. Failure is not inevitable; failure is a choice.

For those visual learners among us :

To learn out more about this, please read the official press release or the article by France 24. Both are well worth your time.

I just wish that at some point in the near future our elected representatives focused less on GDP and more on the actual wellbeing of their constituants and the environment on which we all depend. To do so, countries can start using alternatives to Gross Domestic Product such as Social Progress Index and more.

Likewise many if not most business leaders have been caring exclusively about this quarter’s profits. This short termism is both absolutely wrong from a shareholder view – cf my book review of The Shareholder Value Myth – and as it is absolutely and litterally destroying everything around us : both our societies and our environment suffer immensely.

Having blogged about all these topics for over 18 years now, I just can’t wait to see our communities repairing all the damage done in the past 70 years and start building a desirable future for our kids and for our older selves. If not now, when ?

These exciting news come from research published by Ember, a British energy think tank. The whole publication is worth your time, and I will share with you the most prominent bits. One of their graph shows a booming renewables curve while coal and natural gas are more or less stagnant :

With China and India becoming more efficient on their coal burning and adding more and more solar and wind to meet their needs, it is likely that this trend will continue. For example, in India, solar grew by 25% and wind by 29% in the first half of 2025 compared to the first half of 2024. This represents a total of 28 TWh (that’s 6% of the annual electricity consumption of France, more or less).

Solar is now growing exponentially as it is now by far the cheapest electricity source. Nothing can compete, not coal, not fossil gas and certainly not nuclear and its staggering delays and massive overcosts… Indeed, global solar installations were 64% higher in the first half of 2025 than in the same time last year.

Global emissions have been plateauing for the past few years, or at least have increased much less slowly than before. Of course, this is nowhere near the sharp decline we should be seeing right now if we are to stabilize and eliminate the threat of runaway climate change, but this still means Hope. And Hope is desperately needed when we are on the same planet as powerful old men hellbent on destruction…

Renewables are great AND we still need to accelerate energy efficiency, conservation and sobriety in G20 nations. Now is the time to be more mindful of our ginormous resources consumption. Energy and water should not be squandered as they are nowadays.

I will let you read the full report if you feel so inclined. Whatever far right and conservative politicians and the fossil fuels companies are telling you, this is an exciting boom time for renewables and the global energy transition. And it is up to us all to make these trends continue to grow. ..

Comment lire ce tableau ? La production de 100 g de protéines de bœuf émet 50 kilos de CO₂ équivalent, utilise 750 litres d’eau et mobilise 22 mètres carrés de terre. Pour comparer, la même quantité de protéines issues de soja ne rejette que 2 kilos de CO₂, consomme 100 litres d’eau et n’occupe que 2 mètres carrés de surface.

Voici les chiffres, mis sous forme de graphique. Les échelles CO2 et terrains sont à gauche (en kg de CO2 eq et m² de terres), et celle pour l’eau à droite en litres.

Comme on peut le voir ci-dessus, la viande de boeuf est celle qui a les empreinte carbone et terres les plus importantes (et de loin), le riz est celui qui consomme le plus d’eau. A l’heure de l’emballement du changement climatique et des multiples sécheresses et autres catastrophes climatiques, ne faut-il pas agir aussi sur son alimentation et en limiter ses impacts ?

Le site du CGDD explique que les Français consomment en moyenne 85 kg de viande par an. Cela revient à plus de 230 g de viandes par jour ! Selon une autre source, en 2015, 41% des hommes et 26% des femmes mangeaient plus de 500 g de viandes rouges par semaine. 70% des hommes et 57% des femmes mangeaient plus de 150g de charcuterie par semaine. Ces chiffres ont 10 ans et je serai très intéressé par connaitre les proportions actuelles.

Dans tous les cas, je trouve çà énorme. Alors qu’on le sait maintenant que la consommation de viande rouge et de charcuterie joue un rôle dans le développement de cancers, qu’on sait que la viande de bœuf participe de façon disproportionnée à l’emballement du changement climatique… Qu’attend t’on pour agir ?

L’impératif de l’action est d’autant plus fort que manger moins de viande ne reviendrait qu’à revenir à ce qui se faisait avant dans notre pays. Selon un document du Ministère de la Santé, “En France, entre 1950 et 1990, la consommation de viande (toutes viandes confondues) a progressé continuellement passant de 44 kg/an à 91 kg/an/habitant pour fléchir ensuite aux environs de 85 kg/an/habitant en 1996.”

A titre personnel, je mange entre 80 et 120 g de viande par jour, soit entre un tiers et la moitié de la consommation moyenne française depuis déjà longtemps et j’applique ces idées :
1. Ne manger de la viande qu’à un seul repas par jour (généralement le midi ) ;
2. Diminuer progressivement la taille de la portion (et augmenter celle des légumes pour compenser) ;
3. Remplacer par des légumineuses ou alternatives (“faux” steaks, nuggets, etc…) variées.

Je précise que je ne souffre d’aucune carence. Et que je fais pas mal de sport et me déplace énormément à pied.

A l’heure où le prix de la viande augmente toujours – selon l’Insee, +20% en 5 ans pour le boeuf – j’imagine que beaucoup d’entre nous ont déjà commencé à consommer moins de viandes. C’est tant mieux. Et pour celles et ceux qui ne l’ont pas encore fait, ne vaut-il mieux pas anticiper le changement que de le subir ?

Manger moins de viande, c’est bon pour sa santé, son portefeuille et notre planète !

Photo : Brooke Lark sur Unsplash.

Among the key findings of this study :
– Life-cycle emissions of battery electric cars are 73% lower than gasoline cars.
– When using only renewable electricity, the reduction is up to 78%.
– Life-cycle emissions of hybrids are just 20% lower than gasoline cars.
– Life-cycle emissions of plug-in hybrids are 30% lower than gasoline cars.
– Fuel cell cars – with hydrogen – can lower emissions even further than battery EVs.

WIthout further ado, here are their main findings on a graph form. It’s quite something to look at :

So reading this, one just think that we should all be switching to electric cars, right ? Or… maybe not. Here are a few hot takes on this :

First and foremost we all need much more cycling and walking in our communities. Given how most people use their cars – very short distances under 5 km / 3 miles, this would have strong co-benefits on the obesity epidemic we are facing as well as on lowering air pollution as this would essentially drop CO2 emissions and other polluants to zero.

To get there, we need infrastructure : protected bike lanes, dedicated parkinge-bikes charging stations and so on. All this requires courageous political leadership. There are many bright examples to follow : Paris for its promotion of cycling, New York and London for congestion pricing that decreased the amounts of cars in the city centers…

For longer distances within cities, there are no ways to cut it : public transportation with electric buses or bus rapid transit. Cheaper to run, cleaner and more silent, here is an old blog post on how mass adopting electric buses can be a game changer. Outside of cities, trains are the way but this is a whole other topic.

Manufacturing a whole new car emits a lot of carbon and consumes a lot of energy. The larger models such as the SUVs currently being sold, doubly so. Thus, retrofitting older cars to electric needs to be done on a large scale. This can be done relatively easily and am sure the price could be very competitive if the entire industry switched to this.

So yes, we need electric cars, but not as the sole sustainable transportation solution. It has to be part of a whole ecosystems.

Photo by CHUTTERSNAP on Unsplash

” The violent weather that battered Europe this summer caused short-term economic losses of at least €43bn ($50 billion), according to an EU-wide estimate, with costs expected to rise to €126bn by 2029.

The immediate hit to the economy from a single brutal summer of heat, drought and flooding amounted to 0.26% of the EU’s economic output in 2024 (…).”

The study itself starts in an epic way that will resonate with each of us :

” The economic stability of the Great Moderation at the dawn of the 21st Century has given way to economic turbulence. The past two decades have witnessed the Global Financial Crisis, the Great Recession, the COVID pandemic and more recently Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. These shocks have all been temporary, albeit persistent.

Yet the coming decades risk continued disturbances from worsening structural trends and ever-growing shocks. In the words of Christine Lagarde, “As central bankers, we are now facing a fundamentally different environment: one characterised by more instability, more volatility and more uncertainty about the very structure of the economy” (Lagarde, 2024). Draghi (2024) highlights the economic challenges arising from weak productivity growth and a declining population.

Against this background of heightened economic uncertainty, we investigate the macroeconomic impact of extreme climate events. That these events will become more frequent and more intense over the course of the coming decades looks to be an unfortunate certainty (IPCC, 2021). “

Furthermore, a new study in Nature on the massive wildfires that took place in Canada in 2023 have killed an estimated 82,100 people globally, including 33,000 in the US and 8,300 in Canada. These 6,000 wildfires (!) had burned over 150 000 square kilometers (58,000 square miles)

If our so-called leaders and elected representatives seem only to care for GDP and economic growth, they might as well start addressing climate change seriously.

What do you think ? Will governments increase their respective and collective response to climate change or are you still expecting more business-as-usual ?

On energy transition means :
– Renewables : 780 billion USD will be invested in 2025, +109% compared to 2015 ;
– Grids and storage, 479 billion USD will be invested in 2025, +44% compared to 2015 ;
– Energy efficiency : 429 billion USD will be invested in 2025, +42% compared to 2015 ;
– End-use electrification : 344 billion USD will be invested in 2025, +131% compared to 2015 ;
This makes a grand total of 2.032 Trillion, or 5.5 billion dollars per day ! That’s a 75.6% increase compared to 2015 !

On fossil fuels and nuclear :
– Oil, 535 billion USD will be invested in 2025 , -34% compared to 2015 ;
– Natural gas, 368 billion USD will be invested in 2025, -19% compared to 2015 ;
– Coal, 251 billion USD will be invested in 2025, +13% compared to 2015 ;
– Nuclear, 74 billion USD will be invested in 2025, +64% compared to 2015.
Here the total is of 1.228 Trillion, 20.4% less than in 2015 !

Interesting to read that despite being not much talked about, energy efficiency – when combined with end use electrification – is getting some massive investments, almost as much as renewables : 773 billion versus 780 !

Grids and storage see their investments increasing rapidly as they are the bottleneck right now. Storing cheap or even free electricity to be used later is paramount to our global energy transition. Some places have understood this much better than others. California and Texas in the US are leaders in their country. Australia has been adopting Tesla battery farms for a while now…

As the IEA puts it, the People’s Republic of China is by far the largest investor in energy (both fossil fuels and clean energy), with almost 900 billion USD invested for 2025 alone. The US don’t quite reach 600 billion. The European Union, 386 billion…

We still invest way too much in fossil fuels and nuclear, 1.228 Trllion USD in 2025 compared to 2.032 Trillion in cleantech. The energy transition is thus garnering just under 2/3 of the total energy investments… It would be interesting to see how phasing out both indirect and direct fossil fuels subsidies would impact this.

What do you think ? Will 2026 continue this trend ? I look forward to reading your views and comments !

Sources and image header : IEA (2025), World Energy Investment 2025, IEA, Paris https://www.iea.org/reports/world-energy-investment-2025, Licence: CC BY 4.0

Grid forming inverters will become a key element of switching off fossil fuels plants and relying more and more on wind and solar. Current grid following inverters are great but just don’t provide the vital grid inertia stability we all depend upon.

Wthout further ado I will let you watch the video below :

What do you think ? I look forward to reading your thoughts…

Now that we are closer to 2050 than to the year 2000, it might be a good time to actually do something about climate change, sustainability and the rest. The election of Donald Trump in the US sure don’t point to Mankind finally getting any wiser. The beginning of this second term is completely chaotic and makes one wonder what will be next ? Will it be another pandemic ? World War III ? Who knows ?

There are some certainties though. In any case, we all need to become much more resilient as the world will get quite crazy in the next few years. Wasting less vital resources – energy, water, food – will always pay back. Pursuing renewables will always bring massive savings in terms of money and will always slash pollution.

This blog is now over 18 years old. I would haven’t thought I would still be maintaining this blog, but hey, sustainability is still relevant. We still have ginormous amounts of work to do. Solar and wind and batteries have reached affordability and are changing a lot of things but not everything. The future of our species and of Life on this beautiful planet still hangs in the balance. Now is not the right time to give up…

Image credits : Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash.

I wanted to write an article stating that we are not doomed just yet. Contrary to what Big Oil and some media would lead you to believe, a lot of things can still be done to stop catastrophic global warming and, who knows, at some point down the line, reverse this. This might be utopian, but scientific research and entire books such as Project Drawdown and its sequel, Regeneration, are full of regenerative solutions.

This blog is also full of pragmatic solutions and it’s a matter for all of us to adopt them at scale, such as heat pumps, district heating, renewables, electric buses and bikes, bio-based materials and so on… We have all the tools we need to slash greenhouse gases emissions fast.

Eco anxiety is not just for young folks. Most of the media still thinks that climate issues concern only folks born in the late 90s or even in the 21st century. It’s not the case. Am now 41 and I have had my fair share of this myself. I know grand parents and people in their 60s or 70s that are very concerned too.

Whether you were born in 2001 or 1951, we can all act and turn this ship around. Yes, our climate is warming, yes, there is some more locked in for the near future but there is enormous potential of actions in this decisive decade. The world we live in 2035 will be different from today’s. It’s on all of us to make it a place that is better, nicer and cooler than what it would be if we let the status quo win.

First and foremost, please note that if your eco-anxiety is just too hard to bear and you are thinking of what’s the point of living and doing anything, please consider seeking professional help. Am an energy transition professional, I am in no way, shape or form a shrink.

Here are six steps to make your life

1. Consume solution and action-based climate / sustainability reporting and news (like this blog). If you stick to the doom and gloom of certain media, you will be without a doubt overburdening yourself with negativity and despair. In recent years, solution oriented climate media have emerged. Canary Media, comes to mind. If you are more into non-fiction, solar punk is a branch of science fiction that brings some hope of what the future could look like. Grist has started publishing such novels with its Imagine 2200 contest..

2. Consume as little (stuff / energy / water / resources in general) as can be. In a world that promotes buying all kinds of stuff ad nauseam, this can be a daunting task. Resisting the sirens of marketing and advertisement can be arduous. Consuming less energy at home, for transportation and all the time can equally daunting, especially if you live in an old home or far away from your current work. But the less resources you will consume, the more resilient you will be.

3. Change your banking as Big Oil loves Big Bank and it’s reciprocal (and disgusting). If your hard-earned cash is still in an Oil loving Big Bank, consider transferring most if not all your savings and current account in a local coop or solution that will follow your values. There are more and more solutions available around the world, but beware, some might be some greenwashing. Less money at the conventional oil loving banks will make financing carbon bombs harder and our common future a bit brighter ;

4. Turn this negative energy to action. Whether its making good art, writing hopeful novels, joining a local NGO, writing blog posts, educating yourself, starting a garden, retroffiting homes, switching to a heat pump and/or solar PV… it’s all about not staying with your hands in your pockets and your head down. Get moving. Use this as a catharsis if need be ;

5. Change jobs ! The energy transition already requires millions of blue or white collars workers globally. From retrofitting homes to changing our relationship with soil and agriculture or industry and creating new services, there will be jobs for everyone. Of course, you might either make your current job a green one or you might study to get new skills to get more impact. One quick tip : chat with folks already in the position you seek. You’ll become more knowledgeable about the industry, its players and see if this green dream job is really what it looks like ;

6. Last but not least, VOTE as if your life depended on it. Because it does. Either join a party that is already aligned with sustainability topics or help your party get greener. (of course, some political spheres are just a lost cause… it’s then time to move on…). Under this item I am so pointing to the need to organize at all levels of society. If your city lacks decent cycling infrastructure, you might want to do something about it.

To conclude, these are my top six action list. I am sure I have missed some. What are yours ? How do YOU keep hope on the climate / sustainability issues ? I look forward to reading yours !

Image credits : Unsplash, Johannes Plenio.

But an assigment for my English classes changed all that. I discovered the existential threat of climate change and the massive opportunities of renewable energy sources. Unbeknown to me at first, I just had stumbled on my calling. Getting a job on sustainable development or what we call today the energy transition was tough. It took me years to actually find my ikigai. So, if you are struggling yourself right now, don’t give up. There is a “green” job outthere if you need one.

Back to twenty years ago, of course, the roots for this seemingly drastic change had been planted decades earlier. I grew up in the countryside and knew the beauty of Nature via numerous hikes and so on. My family had made sure I spent some time at the farm to see if I had any inclination towards gardening, growing vegetables and so on. I had watched my fair share of Commandant Cousteau‘s adventures on TV and even read his adventures adapted as comics… So, yes, this correction course was important, but I think that sooner or later I would have done it.

Since this fateful paper, I have never stopped reading – and writing – on climate change, sustainability and our global energy transition. I wrote both my B.A. dissertation and Master’s thesis on these topics. I started this blog, read dozens of books, hundreds of articles. It’s a series of fascinating subjects.

Back to 2004, the renewable energy landscape was at its infancy. The world had installed a grand total of four or five gigawatts of solar photovoltaic capacity. These days, we are installing around the world twice that capacity every single week (More than 10 GW a week to Bloomberg NEF, with a total installed capacity above 1 000 TW). Wind was historically more advanced with 39 GW installed capacity in 2003, compared to over 900 GW today. One can see the exponential curves right there.

I admit I have no clue as to what the market was for energy efficiency and conservation, but given how cheap energy was back then, it didn’t nearly matter as much as it does or should do these days…

Climate change was a distant threat but we were sure that the power that be would be heeding the call. In a way they did, but way too slowly and too little to be meaningful to get us all out of harm’s way. Action on climate change has never been more desperately needed and the signs are incredibly clear.

As I write these few lines, Northeastern France is witnessing temperatures above 20 to even 25 °C, at least 10°C above what would be expected this early in spring. (for Fahrenheit temps : 20°C is 68°F. And we are getting 20°F above “normal” temps for the season). Needless to say, I am not looking forward to summer, especially if it means getting 40 to 45°C (approx 105 to 115 °F) for weeks.

The solutions to climate change, biodiversity collapse and skyrocketing inequalities are well known but their implementation are more of a wicked problem than anything. I am proud to at least do my share by helping local communities save energy, switch to renewables, and in doing so, become more resilient to the massive changes we are witnessing.

Image credits : Jason Leung on Unsplash. I chose this picture because while I am not anymore in Seattle, my time there still remains a key period of my life.

This could make fossil fuels’ exit a much quicker one, how exciting ! This is the kind of magnititude and effort we need to actually halve greenhouse gases emissions as fast as we can. This could actually help the world become net zero by 2040.

For this week’s post, I delved into the solutions advocated in this new report :

1. Retroffiting buildings, this is no mystery to me as I wrote my Master’s thesis on this very topic almost 20 years ago (“tempus fugit” if you ask me). The massive potential savings in both residential and tertiary sectors have been well documented for quite a while now.

From homes to hospitals, from residential buildings to offices, the potential of insulation and weatherization is staggering, especially if we trap carbon by using nature-based materials such as wood, hemp, straw and many others.

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2. Artificial Intelligence can finetune HVAC (heating, ventilation and air conditionning) settings to the closest that is actually needed and thus lead to massive savings, up to 25% . To the research, payback time can be within a year.

If this might sound new to you, I have read case studies dating from 2020 of such technology use and one of the hospitals I happen to work with is already benefitting from AI to cut energy use. This will become mainstream in the next decade and this is really exciting. Be sure I’ll get back to that soon.

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3. Electrifying (and automating) transport. While the benefits of going electric for buses and cars alike is well documented, I am more prone to push for electric assists bikes. (which outsell EVs in the United States, and I imagine in many other countries).

EVs may be four times more efficient than their ICE counterparts, but the balloooning size of cars undermine this. So, to me, electric cars are nice, but getting people to bike more would be so much better, more ebikes are needed and cycling infastructure needs to become much more common.

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4. Reusing waste industrial heat is a massive economic opportunity as dozens of industrial processes in hundreds of plants around the world are just wasting ginormous amounts of heat. Some of which could be used to heat up entire cities in the colder months.

As I noted over a decade earlier in my book review of Crossing the Energy Divide, “The potential for such systems in the United States alone is about 100 GW of capacity, up to ten percent of the electricity capacity”. To a recent search paper, “at least 150 TWh per year of electricity could be generated by harvesting currently untapped thermal energy” in the European Union.

5. Industrial clusters are just the logical continuation of the previous element. Systems thinking just needs to become much more prevalent if we are to become much more energy and resource efficient.

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To conclude on a personal note, I am quite happy to be directly working on four of these elements. Making the local hospitals and nursing homes is my priority and AI is a very promising mean that I will delve more and more in the near future. Urban heating networks are a great mean to heat dozens of places and hundreds of homes and are even better when using some waste industrial heat. Finally, getting some charging stations at our main sites is an endeavor I also work on.

Image credits : World Economic Forum and Markus Spiske on Unsplash.

Indeed, as per DW Planet A Youtube channel (yes, I know, another video), A single (huge) heat pump is heating and cooling 3,500 homes in Mannheim, Germany by using the heat contained in the Rhine river. This is quite an impressive German engineering feat I let you discover below :

Now, for the neat part whether we use heat pumps for residential or district heating applications. According to a study published last year, there is a “symbiotic effect of heat pumps and residential solar” and that “households in Germany, Spain, and Italy can more than triple their savings by pairing PV with heat pumps. It said this combination helped families to save between 62% and 84% on their annual energy bills in 2022.” Check out the full PV Magazine article for more on this.

With the world set to install litteral terrawatts worth of capacity of solar PV in the next decade, there is no doubt that heat pumps will revolutionize the way we heat and cool our homes.

If you are concerned that heat pumps might not be working with whatever cold weather there will be left in our near future, be reassured. As per this article in Euronews.green, “Norway is among the countries with the most heat pumps per capita, along with neighbouring Finland and Sweden.”. More data on that very fact on Carbonswitch.com.

Super efficient, running on super cheap solar electricity, able to either heat or cool homes and other buildings in the worst climates, there is no surprise that the market for this technology is booming. To the prestigious International Energy Agency, “At current growth rates, heat pumps would nearly double their share of heating in buildings by 2030″

The future can be brighter (and much more efficient) if we build it and heat pumps have a critical role to play in this.

Image credits : alpha innotec on Unsplash.

Let’s review some of these facts. First off, some facts and figures from Ember, which recently stated that both fossil fuels generation and CO2 emissions from the European electricity sector fell 19 percent last year alone. Renewables now account for 44% of the EU electricity mix and wind power is now producing more electricity than natural gas. Please read their full report for more exciting news.

Now let’s have a look at the largest European countries and see how each are faring. At the beginning of the year Spain, Germany and the Netherlands announced that they generated 50 % of their electricity from renewables in 2023.

Spain reached this milestone with solar PV accounting for 14 %, solar thermal, 1,8 % ; wind power 23,5% ; hydro 9,5 % and other renewables : 1,4 %. Nuclear accounted for 20,3 % and the remainder was provided by 30 % fossil fuels.

Germany reached 51,6% renewables last year – up from 47 % in 2022. This is the first time it reaches such a high level. The country managed to halve in 10 years its coal consumtion (from 249 TWh in 2014 to 113 TWh in 23) all the while closing its nuclear reactors too. The main economy of the continent still aims for 80 % renewables by 2030, despite closing its last nuclear reactors.

Netherlands has another success story for renewables. In a Linkedin post by Kees van der Leun, one can read that the country reached 54% wind + 7% biomass + 3% solar PV = 64% renewable energy. More solar capacity than France, despite being much less populous, (18 Million people vs 68 million)

Italy counted 11,6 GW of wind power capacity in 2022 and 28,6 GW of solar PV in september 2023. Renewables accounted for 42,8 % of total electricity generation in 2021. The country gets almost half of its electricity from natural gas and was thus, particularly hit with the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the spike in prices.

Coal, like everywhere else in Europe has been plunging, from 19,4 % in 2015 to just 5 % in 2021. To a recent Reuters article, the government is pushing towards energy security and more renewables, so these encouraging results may just be the beginning.

In the United Kingdom, coal is dead and dropped to its lowest level of consumption since… 1757 (You read that right, before the American and French revolutions…). Fossil fuels accounted for a third of electricity in 2023. Cleanest electricity ever. Average of 162 g of CO2 eq / kWh. (18 % reduction in just one year)

Poland, the largest Eastern European nation has long been a coal powerhourse. Yet, renewables there too are moving forward and upward at an accelerated pace and accounted for 21 % in 2022. As Politico notes, « Greenhouse gas emissions in the electricity sector have reduced by a quarter «  between 2005 and 2022, largely thanks to 14 GW of solar in June 2023 (!) and 9 GW of onshore wind.

This might just be the beginning as there is a massive potential for both on and offshore wind. Offshore wind could reach 5,9 GW in 2030 and 18 GW in 2040. To Ember, the country could aim for a total of 50 GW of renewable energy capacity and 50 % of renewables by the end of the decade.

And France… The Macron government sticks its guns to nuclear and wants to build from six to 14 new nuclear reactors. All this despite the ginormous overcosts and delays of Flamanville and other reactors in Europe (Hinkley Point C and so on…).

My home country just had 5 % solar with barely a total of 20 GW installed in 2023. This is a shame when one see thats the Netherlands do so much better with so much less sun . A solar panel in Lyon Or Marseille will produce 30 to 50 percent more than one in Amsterdam. This is such a massive missed opportunity.

Image credits : Karsten Würth on Unsplash.

Recently, his video ” Does energy efficiency just makes us use more stuff “ delved into the famous Jevons Paradox :

The video gives many very interesting facts and figures. So let’s review them quickly :

The video starts with research from the US NGO Environmental Defense Fund stating that ” Americans spend $350 billion a year on electricity – with three-quarters of the energy going to waste.” As you probably know, coal, natural gas and nuclear plants vent off two thirds of the generated energy as waste heat. This staggering energy inefficiency is nuts when one thinks of energy scarcity and the climate emergency we are in.

As an aside, the six solutions advocated are as follow : 1. Switch to renewable energy ; 2. Reduce methane leaks ; 3. Pick power sources that use less water ; 4. Minimize energy loss along wires ; 5. Give people only the voltage they need ; 6. Boost energy-saving tools for homes.

The video goes on with David quoting the International Energy Agency’s data driven work. Their latest energy efficiency report was released around COP 28 and brings many an interesting fact and figure. Among them around the 4.20 mark a chart with the primary energy intensity of countries or group of countries. Russia, Africa and China being the most inefficient and the European Union being the most energy efficient.

According to the IEA, there has been a major escalation in energy efficiency since 2022, with “investment in energy efficiency is up to 45% since 2020”. Electric cars now represent a fifth of all cars being sold in the world and heat pumps outsell gas boilers in most markets. These are good signs of the global decarbonization of our global economies.

Energy effiicency is the first fuel for the IEA‘s executive director, as shown in an extract of a video featuring Fatih Birol. To this effect, still according to the agency, doubling energy efficiency improvement from 2% to 4% would reduce energy bills by a third in “advanced” countries and would contribute about 50% of the necessary emissions cuts by 2030, a staggering 7 billion tons of CO2 per annum. This would also create 4.5 Million jobs globally.

To this affect, the EU improved their energy intensity by 8 percent in 2022 alone, while the US managed a 4 percent improvement. The video goes on then about something I blogged about, namingly how sales of gas powered vehicles have already peaked.

LED lights, electric motors, building regulations… Is energy efficiency finally getting into the limelight and joining renewables in the fight on runaway climate change ?

I applaud for talking about the “absolutely fundamental paradigm shift taking place” right now taking places with energy efficiency. Between renewable energy supply and potential AI solution of flexibility, smart solutions can have a staggering impact on slashing energy use. I shall get back to this very topic soon.

The European Parliament, the Council and the European Commission solemnly proclaimed the following joint Declaration on Cycling with a very ambitious statement :

We aim to unleash the full potential of cycling in the EU. This Declaration recognises cycling as one of the most sustainable, accessible and inclusive, low-cost and healthy forms of transport and recreation, and its key importance for European society and the economy. The Declaration should serve as a strategic compass for existing and future policies and initiatives related to cycling.

The declaration sets out a comprehensive action plan to reach this ambitious objective. Among such action points are :

• Developing and strengthening cycling policies
• Encouraging inclusive and affordable mobility
• Creating more and better cycling infrastructure
• Increasing investments and creating favourable conditions for cycling
• Improving road safety and security
• Supporting green jobs and the development of a world-class European cycling industry
• Supporting multimodality and cycling tourism
• Improving the collection of data on cycling

These are good news as cycling has many an advantage and with electric bikes becoming much more common, it’s easier to climb a hill or go further and farther than one would envision with one’s own strength. Going around by bike is good for one’s health and finances, it’s good for the community with less traffic congestion and local air pollution, and it’s good for the country and the planet with less greenhouse gases emissions. Transport is the first greenhouse gas emitter in France.

But helping cycling becoming more prevalent in our cities and communities is just not about bike paths, or even better, protected bike paths. These need to be operating as a full network, not just some random spots. Additionally, there is need for “better links with public transport, secure parking spaces, the deployment of charging points for e-bikes and bike highways connecting cities with rural areas” as the European Commission points out.

Paris has shown that with some courageous leadership, and millions of euros of investments, rapid transformations can take place. I blogged earlier this year about that very topic. There were no less than 1094 kms (680 miles!) of bike paths in Paris proper in 2021. What if this was replicated in all larger cities around the European Union ?

Let’s hope this declaration will be followed up. France has taken up some interesting progress on cycling but we are not exactly on par with the Netherlands or Denmark just yet.

Image credits : Eyestetix Studio on Unsplash.

Lately, a different story has emerged from China, as its factories started producing enormous amounts of solar panels, wind turbines, electric cars and other staples of the global energy transition. This is why Carbon Brief stated that “China’s carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions are set to fall in 2024 and could be facing structural decline, due to record growth in the installation of new low-carbon energy sources.”

Below is this absolutely inspiring graph that has been republished around the Internet lately (it doesn’t take a maths genius to see where the emissions are trending ) :

Please refer to the whole long post to gain massive insight as to how this is even possible and what it could mean for the entire world.

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For years now, the country has been cleaning up its heavy industries to bring better air quality to Beijing and other cities as local populations became increasingly discontent and concerned. Leaving coal in the ground (or at least stop digging the stuff so damn fast) and switching to a mix of solar and wind is paramount. And the Chinese government knows it.

The “war on pollution” has wielded some impressive results but it’s not over. A lot still needs to be done and neighoring India would be very well inspired to follow suit given how New Delhi is struggling with horrible air quality.

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Aside from electricity generation, transportation is a massive greenhouse gases emitter. So, if for decades, Maoist and Communist China was well known for its bikes as this was the transportation mean for most if not all workers. But consumerism brought cars, and with them, another massive source of pollution. Perpetual traffic jams are a thing in large cities as 300 million people succombed to “car culture” (at least, 300 milion cars were sold in the country…)

Fortunately, what took place in Europe is also happening in China as people are switching back to bikes as the pandemic and bike sharing companies spurred the rebirth of cycling. Local authorities have started investing in infrastructure to fight congestion as well.

I mentioned that earlier, but the Middle Kingdom is also leading the world on electric buses. And it sure is trying to keep on leading as no less than 138,000 electric buses were sold in China in 2022. This massive surge took place as interesting subsidies were put in place. To the International Council on Clean Transportation (ICCT), In 2021, China had more than 90% of the world’s electric buses and trucks.

While European and American automakers mostly sold for the past decade or so Stupidly Useless Vehicles / Socially Unacceptable Vehicles, China is betting on “small” (understand non-SUV) affordable electric cars. And this might be another whole industry that goes East. With electric cars selling in China for less than 5,000 euros, European carmakers from Spain to Germany have reasons to be concerned.

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To conclude, despite all these very encouraging signs, one nees to remember that structural and systemic changes are also needed. China, like other countries around the world needs to switch from a paradigm based on economic growth to another one based on human and social well-being and on regenerating Nature. This is an entire story all together. Let’s hope we’ll be able to tell it.

Image credits : Li Yang on Unsplash.