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Comment by Hikikomori | Hacker News Reader

Interesting and fun read, but don't see how it relates to the near future, and even longer term. Energy demands likely closely follows population growth, which has been trending down for the last 50 years or so. Once it levels out so will energy demands, with some time lag as some countries catches up with standard of living. Unless your argument is that we will be unable to meet our energy demands at that point in time even with large amounts of renewables and nuclear I don't really see your point, even so Germany can likely meet their demands using renewables in the near future and go back to using nuclear at some later point in time.

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Besides, that Germany is extremely bad suited for re-newable energies (little sun, wind at the wrong places, little hydroelectric power):

1. Yes, population growth may stop

2. Your argument with population numbers is totally irrelevant. Economics growth, which is linked to energy consumption, won't stop. If is stops, our society will likely collapse.

https://ourfiniteworld.com/2011/02/21/there-is-no-steady-sta...

In fact, with injecting trillions of dollars in the economy and negative interest rates, we may already have reached the end game. Exactly at the time from predicted by the Club of Rome, I think they predicted trouble for around 2030.

So after your random-blog-post defense failed, you’re gonna completely drop the subject? I’d love to hear a proper response to the parent.

Germany already produces enough renewable energy to sustain all residential use. There is no real physical limitation to achieving 100% renewables despite your “argument”.

These are both very shallow articles. You need to find better sources if you’re gonna spout such claims, big words have no meaning of their own.

"So after your random-blog-post defense failed" I don't see this. The original post was just extraordinary naive.

"Germany already produces enough renewable energy to sustain all residential use." Maybe, a short look at the numbers look inconclusive. Besides that Germany relies on its neighbors to stabilize the net (speak nuclear!), it is unclear for me what the numbers mean. "Residential" use. Including heating? Basically everybody heats with oil or gas in Germany. You would also to take into account production costs (energy) of solar and wind energy harvesting systems. Please also see: "The institute’s Energy Charts project does not include data on the amount of power the generating facilities consume themselves to operate, or the power German industry produces and consumes without it being fed into the public grid."

The is an incredibly stupid publication from an MIT professor, claiming that energy efficiency is increasing (we produce more with less), based on statistical data. I think he did not understand the numbers. The US, like Germany is just exporting energy hungry productions to China. Consequently the numbers show exactly this. I emailed him the data an ask for an explanation based on his thesis but he did not reply.

"There is no real physical limitation to achieving 100% renewables despite your “argument”.

Either you did not read, or did not understand the link I posted. For the sake of the argument, lets assume that Germany CAN produce 100% of the required energy by renewable energy. What you don't take into account (besides exporting energy hungry productions): German does not only have to produce 100% of the energy, she has also to compensate for the GROWTH of energy consumption. Please read the article again. And this is something that is likely physically impossible.

"These are both very shallow articles."

You are free to have your own opinion. I consider both authors extremely smart. Gail Tverberg is possibly one of the smartest people I know. Ugo Bardi (not quoted here) is also worth to read. https://www.amazon.com/Seneca-Effect-Collapse-Frontiers-Coll...

PS: I think it was this guy:

The planet has a fever, and the cure is more capitalism, a prominent researcher argues

https://www.technologyreview.com/2019/06/20/134845/the-plane...

I emailed him that I think energy hungry production is just outsourced to China and that the seemingly more efficient production is misleading. I asked him based on the following two articles, if he still believes in his thesis:

https://ourfiniteworld.com/2011/11/15/is-it-really-possible-...

http://www.declineoftheempire.com/2012/01/wealth-and-energy-...

But he did not reply.

I wasn’t aiming to discuss that “galactic power” growth scenario since it’s just ridiculous. At some point that 3% compound growth becomes more energy than the entire planet consumes in a year, it’s just a dumb extrapolation like folding paper.

Back in reality, Germany’s energy consumption has grown about 5% in the past two decades, is currently falling, and the renewables capacity is more than enough to provide power for all residential uses. It only needs to grow 3x to satisfy the entire country’s energy needs. These are facts, not opinions.

"Back in reality, Germany’s energy consumption has grown about 5% in the past two decades"

Then Germany is just extremely lucky, economically declining or outsourcing energy intensive production tasks.

You iPhone was grown on a tree in Germany?

"dumb extrapolation like folding paper."

This guy is a physics professor. I have meet many stupid people with a STEM degree in my life but stupid people seem somehow extraordinary rare among physicists. His central, important conclusion from the publication is:

"continued growth in energy use becomes physically impossible within conceivable timeframes."

It’s impossible to have a sane discussion if you keep moving the goalposts. You initially ROFLed at the statement that “Germany could become power independent” and said it shows “ignorance and lack of basic math skills”. The data clearly shows that not to be the case. The country is en route to becoming 100% self-sufficient using renewables in the next few decades.

Except in that absurd growth scenario you decided to pick. The thesis that growth is unsustainable, and the math, are correct, I’m not questioning that. It just has no bearing on a more realistic timeline at stake here.

If I invest $500 right now at a 3%/year growth rate, I’ll have about 4,500,000,000,000,000,000,000 dollars after 1400 years. Does that make this investment impossible?

“Germany could become power independent” and I doubt that. First in general, second on statistics (e.g. produce aluminum and other energy expensive products outside of Germany). But I gave you, for the sake of the argument, that it is possible. You still would have to compensate for ongoing energy demand growth. Be it inside Germany or outside. So your "final target" is an exponential moving target.

" It just has no bearing on a more realistic timeline at stake here." 10-30 years in not long. I claim we are seeing the limits of growth, and the central banking voodoo is a sign of it. And again, if economic growth stops, our economy and society will collapse too. A steady state economy can only work on the industrial level of the Amish people.

https://ourfiniteworld.com/

What statistics? What happens in 10-30 years? You haven’t provided a single data point in the context of this conversation. The graph showing the growth over centuries is logarithmic, so that blue line going a little south is actually a massive deviation from an exponential curve and completely disproves the point.

That article talks about 100-300 years as the first physical limits if you kept this absurd growth rate. This is not going to happen unless we reach the singularity, and then yeah you can talk about Dyson spheres and all. Science fiction, not current concerns.

What’s likely in ten years: Germany uses 70% renewables. The country’s energy consumption is down to 1990 levels. This is what the numbers show.

Worldwide, in the past twenty years, energy use has grown by ~70%, a far cry from the 10x increase per century the article supports. And it’s tightly related to more countries becoming developed - for the developed world the consumption has remained the same, as exemplified by Germany.

You’re really drowning in this blog’s kool-aid, do yourself a favor and find some alternative reading that is a bit less doomsday prophecy like.

"The country’s energy consumption is down to 1990 levels."

Yes, sure. Since they outsourced the energy intensive productions. But since you don't want to understand it, it is meaningless to try to explain it to you.

Again you’re stating something to support your worldview based purely on opinion.

The German Industrial Production Index has been sitting at basically the same levels since 1979, check for yourself.

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