Solar must supply 25% of global energy by 2030, scientists say

Inside Climate News

LONDON – Hard on the heels of the latest UN report on climate change, two UK scientists have proposed an ambitious plan to tackle the problem it graphically describes.

Their solution? A massive and urgent international program to increase the world’s production of solar energy – to 10 percent of total global energy supply by 2025, and to 25 percent by 2030.

Sun could supply thousands of times more energy than humanity needs.
Credit: NASA Goddard Laboratory for Atmospheres

The scientists, David King and Richard Layard, say their proposal – which they call a Sunpower Program – should within little more than a decade be producing solar electricity which costs less than fossil fuel power.

They write in the online Observer: “The Sun sends energy to the earth equal to about 5,000 times our total energy needs. It is inconceivable that we cannot collect enough of this energy for our needs, at a reasonable cost.”

Last week the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the IPCC, published the first section of its Fifth Assessment Report, called AR5 for short. It said: “Limiting climate change will require substantial and sustained reductions of greenhouse gas emissions.”

Sir David King was formerly chief scientific adviser to the UK Government, and Lord Layard is the founder-director of the Centre for Economic Performance at the London School of Economics.

They write: “There will always be many sources of non-carbon energy – nuclear fission, hydropower, geothermal, wind, nuclear fusion (possibly) and solar.

“But nuclear fission and hydropower have been around for many years. Nuclear is essential but faces political obstacles and there are physical limits to hydropower. Nuclear fusion remains uncertain.

“And, while wind can play a big role in the UK, in many countries its application is limited. So there is no hope of completely replacing fossil fuel without a major contribution from the power of the Sun.”

Time ‘desperately short’

They recognize the progress being made already: “The price of photovoltaic energy is falling at 10 percent a year, and in Germany a serious amount of unsubsidized solar electricity is already being added to the grid. In California, forward contracts for solar energy are becoming competitive with other fuels and they will become more so, as technology progresses.”

The price of photovoltaic energy is falling at 10 percent a year, and in Germany a serious amount of unsubsidized solar electricity is already being added to the grid.
Credit: The Sky is Not the Limit/Flickr

But time, they say, is “desperately short” – and there are two significant scientific challenges to be overcome: cloudy days and sunless nights, and the cost of sending the electricity produced – in areas with plenty of sunshine but few people – to where it is needed.

The first, they say, needs a major breakthrough in battery science, while the solution to the transmission conundrum needs new materials which are much better at conducting electricity without loss of power.

A German group, Desertec, announced plans to produce solar energy in the Middle East and North Africa and to transmit the surplus to Europe. It identified both the problems King and Layard have recognized, but the scheme was reported in July to have collapsed, partly because of market skepticism.

The authors acknowledge that their proposal amounts to “a major scientific challenge, not unlike the challenge of developing the atom bomb or sending a man to the moon”.

And they believe this challenge is also surmountable: “Science rose to those challenges because a clear goal and timetable were set and enough public money was provided for the research. These programs had high political profile and public visibility.

“They attracted many of the best minds of the age. The issue of climate change and energy is even more important and it needs the same treatment.”

Source: Inside Climate News. Reproduced with permission.

Comments

4 responses to “Solar must supply 25% of global energy by 2030, scientists say”

  1. JackSavage Avatar
    JackSavage

    Time desperately short? Not according to leaked drafts of the latest IPCC reports.

  2. ClimateLearner Avatar
    ClimateLearner

    King and Layard presumably have a good opinion of themselves, perhaps even as some kind of farsighted heroes or pioneers. I rather fear history will not support such views. We have had to put up with no end of political and financial opportunists whose eyes have lit up at what climate scaremongering could bring them. But as the climate system continues to defy the alarming projections of vested interests, it may be sooner rather than later that this crazy bubble of superficial analysis and fearful futures will well and truly burst.

    1. anderlan Avatar
      anderlan

      The vested interests are fossil fuel companies. The owners of existing energy companies have unholy amounts of money to buy politician slaves and use the law the erect barriers to new industry. This should not be allowed. Even though most of the public supports removing fossil fuel subsidies, and science recommends a fossil fuel fee that could be used to lower taxes on work and income, fossil fuel diabolically protects itself by using existing money to try to enshrine its position forever despite costs to human life and the laws of the universe. I and others will do everything we can to stop it.

      While you may not be a paid servant of anti-human-life, anti-progress, anti-technology, anti-true-free-market, anti-civilization fossil protectors, there are many that exist on the internet. They remind me, together with the wishy-washy statements of politicians who benefited from the more than 100 million dollars spent this year in Washington by the fossil fuel industry, that there are those that put existing money against the truth and human life. They remind me and others to keep fighting and not stop until fossil fuel power has been destroyed and the industry has accepted its proper and wise decimation in favor of better technology.

    2. Silverionmox Avatar
      Silverionmox

      You’ll never agree that the effects are significant until they’re in full force – i.e. until it’s too late. And then you’ll switch to the argument that, while climate change is real, it’s not our fault but somehow but solar forcing or whatever.

      I’d rather err on the side of caution. If I’m proved wrong we’ll have a much more energy-efficiënt economy to use the saved fossil fuel in. If you’re proved wrong we’ll have a fucked up climate and a wasteful economy to deal with the effects.

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