Climate security, energy security

… price, cheapness and reliability will be the deciders of the world energy mix. Somehow the future has to be brought into the present and the motives and fears which move people and nations now harnessed to the longer term goals. Reducing the carbon in the atmosphere involves an intergenerational bargain and a huge leap of faith. But has anyone told the public the price of that bargain?

The authors point out that investment decisions required to transform the energy supply and demand patterns of the globe require long term commitment and therefore a high degree both of policy continuity and price predictability.

When oil prices plummet, everyone gives up on energy efficiency and ideas for energy saving go out the window, thus undermining the global warming struggle. The point is illustrated by recounting how when energy prices rose in the mid 1970s and then dived in the 1980s, most advanced societies, including Australia and the United States of America, rode the cheap oil wave and celebrated with gas guzzling V8s.

To further exacerbate its ill judged over reliance on Arabian crude, the development of nuclear power in the West (the notable exception being France) went on hold.

The singular over riding message of the book is to force us to combine the mind numbing technicalities and current dangers in the global energy supply pattern with the environmental concern about global warming. The harnessing of the two causes - of energy security and climate security - would create a unity of global purpose that is lacking at present.

Three reasons give hope that a repeat of the past is not inevitable.

First, after the oil price collapse in the 1980s, it all looked too easy. Oil was cheap and plentiful, yet that proved a dangerous delusion. This time it is hoped that governments and consumers are savvier. They may just realise that a pause in the relentless upward movement in prices is merely a temporary blip.

Second, the whole world wide energy situation remains precarious, especially the Middle East, which is sinking into even more turbulence. Other oil producing regions, such as Nigeria and Azerbaijan, are not exactly enveloped in rings of political stability either.

Third, the longer term concerns about climate change are at last getting through. The timescale may seem eternal, but the general worry about global warming combined with visible and dramatic current signs of climate change have gripped the public’s mind.

The authors dream of a scheme for pricing carbon which will present consumers with the true cost of the energy they consume. If such a scheme can be established worldwide, and sold well, then the process of real change can at last be triggered. But the “ifs” are very big, and carbon taxes and emission trading schemes, are created by humans, and are subject to the vagaries of politics.

Consumers who are eking out a living in order to pay their utility bills and petrol costs, do not take too kindly to further painful charges and taxes in the name of averting at best, or meeting at worst, a dubious future danger. And politicians who want to stay in office are nervous of adding to the tax burden, when the reasons for the extra taxes are not well understood by the electorate, if at all.

The book is pockmarked with several anecdotes to fortify the writers’ laser like focus on energy security. One of the more interesting stories reminds the reader that the biggest and most successful national endeavour to slash CO2 emissions in modern times had absolutely nothing to do with cleaning up the atmosphere. Rather, the huge French nuclear program - a complex of 58 power stations - was started in the 1970s to reduce French reliance on Arab crude oil and imported coal. The result is that today, French electricity generation is virtually carbon free.

Imagine that? Focusing on energy security and reaping the harvest of climate security as a by product in the process?

Who would have thought?