Climate change is too complex a problem to be solved by hard metrics and personal preferences

Thomas

This is part two of a two-part series on new investment metrics adapted to the realities of climate change. You can find part one <a href="https://illuminem.com/illuminemvoices/investment-metrics-for-climate-change-iii-it-will-cost-us-dearly" target="_blank" rel="noopener">here</a>.
Let&rsquo;s dive right into our top focus, which is CO2. As described in <a href="https://illuminem.com/illuminemvoices/investment-metrics-for-climate-change-iii-it-will-cost-us-dearly" target="_self">part one</a>, battling climate change consists of two components: mitigation and adaptation. Concerning CO2, mitigation means avoiding CO2 emissions, and adaptation means removing already emitted CO2 from the atmosphere.
And just as described in <a href="https://illuminem.com/illuminemvoices/investment-metrics-for-climate-change-iii-it-will-cost-us-dearly" target="_self">part one</a>, CO2 removal (adaptation) is more costly than CO2 avoidance (mitigation), but we cannot afford to focus on mitigation alone anymore.
No matter if we look at CO2 avoidance or CO2 removal, the core metrics for effective energy investments are the same.
<h2 id="06ba" class="abd abe fg be abf ud abg gc ug uh abh gf uk xd abi xe xf xg abj xh xi xj abk xk xl abl bj">Core metric 1: avoided tons of CO2 per dollar invested</h2>
We cannot afford the luxury of ideology. The times of investing in 10% fuel efficiency improvement projects or disposable tableware made of bamboo are over. We need to measure every investment against avoided tons of CO2 per dollar invested.
And here, there is a clear primary target: coal.&nbsp;<a class="af ml" href="https://www.economist.com/special-report/2021/10/27/the-economics-of-the-climate" target="_blank" rel="noopener ugc nofollow">Coal is a relict from the industrialization of the 19th century</a>, one of the most polluting fuels, and still widely used all around the world. Strangely enough, coal is one of the core fuels to produce electricity, even though&nbsp;<a class="af ml" href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelbarnard/2023/08/11/the-short-list-of-climate-actions-that-will-work/?sh=7785778b487c" target="_blank" rel="noopener ugc nofollow">electrification is often heralded as&nbsp;the&nbsp;solution</a>&nbsp;to climate change. I agree that electrification will solve a large part of our problems if done right &mdash; but not if we use coal to produce electricity, we forget to invest in powerful and modern grid infrastructure to transmit all that solar and wind electricity, or if we&nbsp;<a class="af ml" href="https://medium.com/a-balanced-transition/electric-cars-and-energy-security-out-of-the-frying-pan-and-into-the-fire-a3a27bfb54d5" rel="noopener">replace our strategic oil dependency by a critical mineral dependency</a>&nbsp;for battery production.
There aren&rsquo;t any silver bullets in climate change engineering, so let&rsquo;s not promote&nbsp;one single&nbsp;solution to fight climate change; we will need many different solutions for all our problems.
And therefore, here is the secondary target: oil and gas.&nbsp;The fossil energy economy is a relict of the 20th century, and it needs to go quickly if we want to ever reach zero emissions. Whether fossil fuels are replaced by renewable energy sources or by avoiding some of the consumption at all doesn&rsquo;t matter &mdash; remember that it&rsquo;s the avoided tons of CO2 per dollar invested that is relevant.
It&rsquo;s that easy. Removing coal, oil, and gas from the global economy will do the trick.
It&rsquo;s not that easy, of course, because we need to remove coal, oil, and gas&nbsp;globally. Think of all the people around the world earning a living from those industries. If they suddenly can&rsquo;t make a living anymore, it&rsquo;s going to be difficult. In this respect, there are huge differences between different regions. With three-quarters of the world&rsquo;s coal being produced and consumed in Asia and Australia, try to explain to that coal mine worker in rural India why his government should ban the commodity that earns him his modest income. Resistance to change largely reflects vested interests, often due to forced circumstances: <a class="af ml" href="https://www.economist.com/special-report/2021/10/27/how-asia-is-crucial-in-the-battle-against-climate-change" target="_blank" rel="noopener ugc nofollow">Not being able to propose to your sweetheart because you can&rsquo;t afford the wedding after your coal mine job is gone&nbsp;</a>might be a reason why you&rsquo;re not so supportive of sunsetting the coal industry for good.
If we manage to get rid of coal, oil, and gas, and on top to mitigate the social consequences of doing so, we&rsquo;re already on a pretty good path.
<h2 id="a9e0" class="abd abe fg be abf ud abg gc ug uh abh gf uk xd abi xe xf xg abj xh xi xj abk xk xl abl bj">Core metric 2: time-to-implementation</h2>
We need to make sure that investments with the best scores regarding avoided or removed tons of CO2 per dollar invested are made first. Remember from <a href="https://illuminem.com/illuminemvoices/investment-metrics-for-climate-change-iii-it-will-cost-us-dearly" target="_self">part one</a>&nbsp;that we are short on time and short on funds.
And here is the spoiler for all new technology geeks: this might mean that we start with proven, boring technologies rather than with new, fancy technologies. Because we are running out of time to combat climate change, having a good solution scaling quickly is much better than having an awesome solution that takes two decades to develop and another two decades to scale.
Let&rsquo;s illustrate this by looking at a few technology examples.
Hydroelectric dams, photovoltaics, and large-scale wind farms work well and can be deployed and scaled relatively quickly &mdash; because they are proven technologies. However, the political environment and the resulting regulations often hinder time-to-implementation and scalability: For example, there are some green activists in my home country who still fight against new large-scale hydroelectric projects on the grounds of protecting habitats in areas that were covered by glacier ice less than a decade ago. I leave it to you to judge if it&rsquo;s better to build a new hydroelectric dam high in the mountains, or import electricity generated by fossil fuels.
I almost don&rsquo;t dare say it loudly, but nuclear technology is also a proven low-emissions technology &mdash; albeit with its own problems of course. Whilst building new nuclear power stations might neither be quick nor sensible in the long term, extending the lifespan of existing nuclear power stations might provide us with lots of coal-free electricity at least for a couple of decades.&nbsp;<a class="af ml" href="https://www.nzz.ch/wirtschaft/netto-null-2050-am-guenstigsten-ist-es-wenn-akw-laenger-laufen-ld.1711605" target="_blank" rel="noopener ugc nofollow">Model calculations</a>&nbsp;also suggest that getting to net zero emissions is the cheapest when taking the modernization of existing nuclear power stations into account.
Compare this with the 20+ years of announcements that fusion reactors will be available at any moment. In 1999, when I was in high school, I had the chance to visit the Joint European Torus (JET) project in Culham, England.&nbsp;<a class="af ml" href="https://www.economist.com/the-economist-explains/2023/08/07/what-is-nuclear-fusion" target="_blank" rel="noopener ugc nofollow">This project will be shut down at the end of 2023</a>, with three companies setting up shop in the same location. They aim to build demonstration plants, but it&rsquo;s still unclear if fusion power has the commercial potential its proponents hope.
Last but not least, let&rsquo;s talk about synthetic aviation fuel. Replacing oil for long-distance flights is one of the harder problems in battling climate change.&nbsp;<a class="af ml" href="https://medium.com/predict/investment-metrics-for-climate-change-part-1-it-will-cost-us-dearly-3b8d47465790" rel="noopener">Creating synthetic kerosene out of air and sunlight is possible now, but still 4&ndash;6 times more expensive than regular kerosene.</a>
As for all new technologies, scaling and reaching cost efficiency for fusion power and synthetic kerosene will take time &mdash; time we don&rsquo;t have anymore if we want to effectively curb climate change.
At the same time, just because we are running out of time doesn&rsquo;t mean it&rsquo;s not sensible to pursue new technologies. We just need to focus on projects with a favorable time-to-implementation score &mdash; which will buy us time until the new technologies become effective at scale and affordable.
There is another thing that can buy us time: CO2 removal. No matter if we use large-scale reforestation, soil carbon sequestration, or direct air capture, removing CO2 from the atmosphere will slow down climate change and buy us time to fully transition from coal, oil, and gas towards renewable energy.
Just like with CO2 avoidance, always keep the economics in mind when looking at CO2 removal projects.&nbsp;<a class="af ml" href="https://blog-toucan-earth.cdn.ampproject.org/c/s/blog.toucan.earth/deep-dive-carbon-removal-solutions/amp/" target="_blank" rel="noopener ugc nofollow">Removing one ton of CO2 through soil carbon sequestration is still 5&ndash;10x cheaper than removing one ton of CO2 through direct air capture.</a>
<h2 id="e539" class="abd abe fg be abf ud abg gc ug uh abh gf uk xd abi xe xf xg abj xh xi xj abk xk xl abl bj">Core metric 3: energy input-to-output</h2>
New technologies are exciting, deserve the benefit of the doubt, and should be allowed to fail.&nbsp;<a class="af ml" href="https://www.economist.com/science-and-technology/2021/06/03/a-growing-number-of-governments-hope-to-clone-americas-darpa" target="_blank" rel="noopener ugc nofollow">That&rsquo;s how agencies like DARPA work</a>&nbsp;to generate breakthrough innovations like the internet, self-healing fabric, and others.
The difference between military innovations created by DARPA and energy innovations is that the military usually doesn&rsquo;t care too much about energy consumption. Effects-on-target and time-on-target decide between victory and defeat, not energy efficiency.
To achieve net zero, we need to be careful not to create new energy technologies that consume more energy than we get out of it. For example, fusion reactors still need more energy input to spark the fusion than they produce energy output. Hydrogen production is still surprisingly un-green because much of the consumed energy to produce it comes from fossil fuels. Direct air capture consumes much more energy than reforestation.
Energy input-to-output is a variable metric. Technologies tend to become more energy-efficient over time, so assessing a technology&rsquo;s energy efficiency over the past few years might provide informative insights into its scaling readiness and potential.
<h2 id="b665" class="abd abe fg be abf ud abg gc ug uh abh gf uk xd abi xe xf xg abj xh xi xj abk xk xl abl bj">Conclusion</h2>
In this part, we looked at the hard investment metrics. However, hard metrics are not enough to assess climate change investments. You should weigh those core metrics to reflect your personal investment preferences.
Climate change is too complex a problem to be solved by hard metrics and personal preferences.
illuminem Voices is a democratic space presenting the thoughts and opinions of leading Sustainability &amp; Energy writers, their opinions do not necessarily represent those of illuminem.

Investment metrics for climate change (II/II): CO2 is our top priority

Whilst it is too late to focus on climate change mitigation alone, it would be fatal to focus only on climate change adaptation

Investment metrics for climate change (I/II): it will cost us dearly

Think twice if it really makes sense to install small wind turbines on your home, or if you’d rather invest in a wind park with large turbines that can harvest the high wind speeds at higher altitudes above ground

&ldquo;Every kilowatt hour counts.&rdquo;
&ldquo;The lights will go out in the dark winter months.&rdquo;
&ldquo;We need to break free from Russian fossil energy.&rdquo;
These statements were heard by many politicians in Europe over the last twelve months. They have fueled a solar panel installation frenzy on residential buildings, which is certainly a move in the right direction.
As described in an earlier article, I have been pioneering solar-self sufficiency for almost 10 years on my own house, reaching self-sufficiency levels of 70&ndash;80% in the meantime thanks to my vertical panels and a building control system.
However, 70&ndash;80% is not 100%. So what can homeowners do to go beyond 70&ndash;80% of self-sufficiency?
Often, the first possibility that jumps to mind is wind power. Let&rsquo;s look at the pros and cons.
<h2>The data</h2>
Solar and wind power are complementary: While the sun shines only during daylight hours, wind is available 24/7. Furthermore, winds are stronger in winter than in summer, so they should compensate for lower solar power yields in winter.
Let&rsquo;s look at some data from the residential area where I live. I am considering the period of November 2022 to February 2023 in this article, in order to cover the dark winter months where wind power should yield most of its benefits.
<img style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" src="https://illuminem.b-cdn.net/articlebody/c4bd94ecedc9cca54217d20cd977643f896cd512.png?" alt="graph on wind data from author's home" /><img src="https://illuminem.b-cdn.net/articlebody/9ab0f44f20c245774a450af395dac67c396c23fd.png?" alt="graph on wind data from author's home" />
It looks like I am not living in a super windy region. That is understandable, as I live in the middle of a village in the flatlands. My wind gauge is on the carport, around 4 meters above the ground.
The blue line in the above charts shows the consistent winds, whereas the black line shows the maximum wind speed or the gusts.
It&rsquo;s simple: the higher up you measure, the higher the wind speeds. And because wind power production increases disproportionately with increasing wind speed, you really want to earn higher wind speeds high above the ground.
Let&rsquo;s look at an example. The SkyWind NG small wind turbine features the following power characteristics:
Cut-off speed: 4 m/s (i.e. no power production for wind speeds below 4 m/s)
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Wind speed of 5 m/s: 20 W power production</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Wind speed of 10 m/s: 180 W power production</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Wind speed of 15 m/s: 580 W power production</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Wind speed of 20+ m/s: 900 W power production</li>
</ul>
The SkyWind NG is a small wind turbine of 1,000 W nominal power for residential use.
Using the measured wind data above, here is the energy that I could have produced in the months of November 2022 &mdash; February 2023 using one of those turbines:
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Consistent winds: 2.5 kWh (!)</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Gust winds: 157 kWh</li>
</ul>
This means that installing a small wind turbine on my carport at 4 m above the ground would make no sense whatsoever. However, assuming that I could earn the full gust winds on the rooftop of my house, 12 m above the ground, it might start to make sense.
Using the SkyWind NG product picture above and comparing this to the situation at my house, here is how the position of a small wind turbine would impact energy production:
<img style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" src="https://illuminem.b-cdn.net/articlebody/9bc16361327316b3ec8fe76ef52a0b7b77ac5850.png?" alt="picture of potential wind energy production sites in the author's home" />
Now, how would 157 kWh between November 2022 and February 2023 impact the solar self-sufficiency of my house?
The increase in self-sufficiency is minimal, even when I would install a couple of those small wind turbines mentioned above:
<img style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" src="https://illuminem.b-cdn.net/articlebody/de629c9238016cb97faadd3e3e3cdc1f68a80f9c.png?" alt="graph on self-sufficiency with and without wind turbines" />
Compare this to the increase in self-sufficiency I achieved by installing vertical solar panels on the facade of my house:
<h2><img style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" src="https://illuminem.b-cdn.net/articlebody/ad119ba2bbc7355a5557c3697c67fe685bc1ae9c.png?" alt="graph on self-sufficiency with and without vertical panels" />The critical points</h2>
Summing up, small wind turbines really have limited benefits in residential areas &mdash; unless you are living on the top of a hill, where wind speeds are constantly high.
Besides the fact that not all sites are suitable for wind power production, a few other points need to be considered before installing small wind turbines:
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">In contrast to solar panels, wind turbines contain moving parts. Therefore, they will be subject to wear and tear.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Moving parts create noise, which can be directly transmitted to the structure of your house. So in case you have your bedroom in the attic, think carefully if having a wind turbine sitting right above your bed makes sense or not.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Last but not least, many residential areas are still governed by tight building regulations, requiring permits to build wind turbines or even prohibiting their installation at all.</li>
</ul>
<h2>Conclusion</h2>
Wind power is a great technology, as it is available in abundance and it is complementary to solar power. However, I would think twice if it really makes sense to install small wind turbines on your home, or if you&rsquo;d rather invest in a wind park with large turbines that can harvest the high wind speeds at higher altitudes above ground.
Generated kWh per invested dollar should guide your investment, not a misleading piece-of-mind feeling favoring high self-sufficiency at home.
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This article is also published on the author's <a href="https://medium.com/predict/does-a-small-wind-turbine-on-your-home-increase-self-sufficiency-e0bc5ba756fd" target="_blank" rel="noopener">blog</a>. illuminem Voices is a democratic space presenting the thoughts and opinions of leading Sustainability &amp; Energy writers, their opinions do not necessarily represent those of illuminem.
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Thomas Vogel

Thomas Vogel

Investment metrics for climate change (II/II): CO2 is our top priority

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