Excellent article!...I keep staring at your subtle subtitle - "How a deadly fire can inform the energy transition."
There is so much useful information available to consider, yet the dogmatic transition approach sweeps it aside. This reminds me of the Great Financial Crisis of 2008-2009. Housing in the United States is often front and center when discussing that period. I find it interesting when people choose to blame a given individual or institution or a small group of either of those. "They should be in jail!" This finger pointing ignores the many signs that were visible prior to the crash. As one example, who could possibly think that low or no documentation loans made to home buyers was a good thing? (Side note - The excuse was that it didn't matter, because a large nationwide decline in housing prices had never happened in the United States.) Yet this had become a rather common practice. The mess ultimately had interconnected groups of people who, in the short run, ALL benefitted. This would include builders, real estate brokers, lenders, money managers who bought mortgage securities, appraisers, etc. The signs were all there.
Thank you Douglas, I like the analogy with the GFC/SubPrime - specifically that in such a situation, "many interconnected groups of people who, in the short run, all benefitted" - seems so fitting. And this goes to my point in the footnote - that no one (as far as I know) is doing anything illegal or immoral in the energy transition. People will say "hey I was just building wind turbines, its not my fault"...
I really like your simple point that we drive cars despite the risk. If we could only apply that thinking to nuclear waste, rather than stopping all nuclear because regulators insist on a risk level of zero, which is an impossible standard. Nuclear waste is small and manageable.
The phrase "so far so good" in energy policies reminds me of a joke I heard somebody tell the other day - a man jumped off a 60 story building, and a person on the 30th floor heard him say "So far, so good" on his way down.
I'm also reminded of an idea that I saw somewhere - that the early part of the enerygy transition is easy - like a person standing on one leg and saying "look at me... I'm half way to flying!"
I love the safety culture of oil rigs. I have never been on one (I did safety training including helicopter egress) in case I needed to visit one when I worked for RR, but I am broadly aware of how it works. I have studied Piper Alpha a lot. Nuke industry is similar. Aerospace similar.
Excellent article!...I keep staring at your subtle subtitle - "How a deadly fire can inform the energy transition."
There is so much useful information available to consider, yet the dogmatic transition approach sweeps it aside. This reminds me of the Great Financial Crisis of 2008-2009. Housing in the United States is often front and center when discussing that period. I find it interesting when people choose to blame a given individual or institution or a small group of either of those. "They should be in jail!" This finger pointing ignores the many signs that were visible prior to the crash. As one example, who could possibly think that low or no documentation loans made to home buyers was a good thing? (Side note - The excuse was that it didn't matter, because a large nationwide decline in housing prices had never happened in the United States.) Yet this had become a rather common practice. The mess ultimately had interconnected groups of people who, in the short run, ALL benefitted. This would include builders, real estate brokers, lenders, money managers who bought mortgage securities, appraisers, etc. The signs were all there.
Thanks for this thoughtful, well written piece.
Thank you Douglas, I like the analogy with the GFC/SubPrime - specifically that in such a situation, "many interconnected groups of people who, in the short run, all benefitted" - seems so fitting. And this goes to my point in the footnote - that no one (as far as I know) is doing anything illegal or immoral in the energy transition. People will say "hey I was just building wind turbines, its not my fault"...
Exactly
I really like your simple point that we drive cars despite the risk. If we could only apply that thinking to nuclear waste, rather than stopping all nuclear because regulators insist on a risk level of zero, which is an impossible standard. Nuclear waste is small and manageable.
The phrase "so far so good" in energy policies reminds me of a joke I heard somebody tell the other day - a man jumped off a 60 story building, and a person on the 30th floor heard him say "So far, so good" on his way down.
I'm also reminded of an idea that I saw somewhere - that the early part of the enerygy transition is easy - like a person standing on one leg and saying "look at me... I'm half way to flying!"
I love the safety culture of oil rigs. I have never been on one (I did safety training including helicopter egress) in case I needed to visit one when I worked for RR, but I am broadly aware of how it works. I have studied Piper Alpha a lot. Nuke industry is similar. Aerospace similar.