The robust carbon intensity of global primary energy

[GliderGuider]

Over the sixty+ years since 1950 the amount of carbon emitted per exajoule of global primary energy consumption (counting both electricity and transportation) has remained constant at ~16 Mt/Ej. This robustness - even with the growing awareness of the climate change threat - indicates that the situation will not be changed rapidly, or easily. Our civilization has apparently recognized that the energy characteristics of fossil fuels are simply too attractive to ignore - even when we understand that it represents an existential threat to civilization.

One pointer to the psychology around this conundrum is given in the following study conducted by Technische Universität München (TUM), Indiana University, and Oklahoma State University:

Many Entrepreneurs Claim to Care About Sustainability, Yet Make Decisions That Are Harmful to Environment

Many entrepreneurs claim that they care about sustainability, yet they make decisions that are harmful to the environment. Economic researchers from Germany and the USA have discovered that many bosses do indeed have firm convictions when it comes to the environment -- but that they then unconsciously disengage their values from their business actions. The type of entrepreneur most likely to fall into this category are those who perceive themselves as highly influential or who are operating in a challenging industry environment. The researchers' findings have shed new light on the significance of moral values and the subconscious in the context of making business decisions. The study could influence environmental legislation and the training of the next generation of entrepreneurs.

The research team found that even entrepreneurs with a strong respect for nature made decisions with a harmful effect on the environment. These decisions were not reached on the basis of any conscious process, however. "We found that the research subjects unconsciously adjusted the relationship between their values and their actions -- with the effect that their actions seemed to coincide once more with their values," explains Prof. Holger Patzelt of the Chair of Entrepreneurship at TUM.

The researchers noted, however, that not all of the entrepreneurs displayed this disengagement of pro-environmental values. What these entrepreneurs had in common was a high level of entrepreneurial self-efficacy and a challenging business climate. According to the received theory up to now, entrepreneurs with low self-efficacy were thought more likely to experience a conflict with their own values.

Holger Patzelt comments further on the findings of the "I care about nature, but ..." study: "Entrepreneurs with very high entrepreneurial self-efficacy want to exert influence. This makes them more likely to disengage from values that limit their options. The same principle applies to an unfavorable industry environment, for example if the company is facing sharp competition. In such situations, too, company bosses believe that everything hinges on their decisions."

[pscot]

1. What exactly

is high entrepreneurial self-efficacy? Does this have something to do with Hatrack's Principle?

[GliderGuider]

2. I think it's a polite way of describing someone who has an...

"exaggerated sense of their own importance and capability"

[Iterate]

3. I wonder what the minimum is to sustain life and limb.

Just a thought and a thought experiment.

Back when things were merely serious and David Wasdell was reminding everyone about tipping points, I half expected him to mention some kind of near-term global minimum, but he didn't. So I set out looking. Google has failed me (far, far too much noise in the results, I wonder if anyone else is having that problem). It matters because any collapse would set off secondary positive social feedbacks, like kicking population growth again, drone wars (either plonking the other guys coal plants or playing salt-the-earth with reactors), and futile efforts to build dams around coasts.

What I was thinking of was a number, either Mt/Ej or CO2 per capita, that would cover the necessities for life and transition but no more. No extra for new anything that isn't net zero CO2. No new third fridge, no new highways, no new sub-developments. Not even a fill at the Donut Castle Pit Stop. Sorry.

Not that I'm an extremist: grow the food, teach the kids, heat the house. Hospital bedsheets still get steamed regardless of the source, that sort of thing.

Given that a number like that is really, really unfun to calculate, what if we take the current world average of 4.8 Mtons per capita and make that the new (temporary)maximum. Nations at that level now are doing well enough, living without famine or pestilence. The EU is at about 7.5-8.5, so that's a reasonable task. Qatar wouldn't know what to do with itself. North America would throw a major temper tantrum. Sorry.

I'd hoped to add some totals here, but have run out of daylight, so for now I can only ask the question:

Would that be enough? How much time would it buy us? Or does the (temporary) maximum have to be halved immediately?

[GliderGuider]

4. If we reduce energy consumption, civilization begins to decay, and people begin to die.

Because civilization (which is composed of all our accumulated capital plus a bunch of people) is essentially a thermodynamic heat engine, there's no way around that outcome.

So the question is, how much decay are we willing to tolerate? What's that I hear? None? Okey-dokey then...

Seriously though, I suspect the aggregate problem of civilization, population, human activity and consumption is far too complex to analyze that way. We could each survive on probably 10x food energy, but it wouldn't be pretty. Plus the poor would fall off the plate first, leaving such a plan open to charges of genocide...

This is why I've stopped proposing, or even looking for, solutions. As far as I can tell, there really aren't any. There never were - as far back as you care to look.

[Iterate]

5. I don't see any states in decay or collapse until you get below 1.5 or so Mtons per capita.

Argentina, Chile, Lithuania...all currently at about 4.0. Even Cuba at 2.1 or so for 50 years can't be said to be in a state of collapse, but it does suggest a level at which improvement is difficult.

In fact, it's the children of the British empire who seem to have the biggest problem with high numbers. All of that suggests to me that there is a strong cultural/ consumption and economic structure component to the puzzle.

But...that wasn't the point I was originally trying to make. Simply, if the minimum amount of CO2 currently necessary for life and transition is an order of magnitude higher than the the point at which we reach the Wasdell described tipping points and runaway heating, then you are correct and we are well and truly fucked. Then it's time to invest effort in personalized time capsules and dry desert caves.

If it's not, or if the numbers are close, or if the number has not already passed, well then, the greedy, the clueless, the footdraggers, the deniers are, as Wasdell put it, guilty of a crime against life itself. That knowledge may not matter in the long run, I know.

Here is Wasdell with a bit more passion in his voice. The summary starts at about 6:00.

[GliderGuider]

7. You can't really look at individual states for this purpose

Global civilization is too cross-linked to allow any state to stand or fall alone. If the overall global energy begins to drop, the flow through the system as a whole will decrease. Energy flow is what allows self-organizing systems to maintain their structure and size. If the flow diminishes, the system begins to lose either structure or size.

Some nations will fall faster than others, but that's not really the issue for me.

Take a human body as the analog of our civilization. Individual cells (analogous to individual humans) can die without affecting the body as a whole; if an organ (analogous to a nation) becomes necrotic it will affect other organs and the overall system to some extent. But if the energy flow through the whole system is compromised - by starvation in the human analogy - the system begins to decline. First the body enters a catabolic state in which it burns up its stored reserves of fat and then muscle. If the energy shortage is prolonged, organ shutdown begins. If it persists longer, the body dies.

From a thermodynamic point of view, exactly the same thing happens to any self-organizing system that is deprived of energy. If we're talking about a civilization that runs short of energy, first we start burning the furniture (catabolism); then weak nations begin to fail; then the whole system loses coherence and fails. At that point all the cells (i.e. people) begin to die.

[Iterate]

8. Ok. I can better see now where our ideas are diverging.

I guess I have to make a better case (and have more evidence) for a more culturally deterministic view. It's not that I don't agree that energy and energy flow matters to the system and its health, but I'm adding culture as an intermediate step that translates and synchronizes actions before it emerges at the system level.

'til later.

[phantom power]

6. if you squint, it's been plateaued since 1915

if you squint even harder, since 1900, just for round numbers