Re: <nettime> What is a global energy regime shift?

[Felix Stalder <felix@openflows.com>]

Someone bugged me off-list to provide some evidence to the sweeping
claims I make here. Let me try.

> It's of course hard to say where all of this is going, but the timing
> is certainly good because many pieces necessary for such a 
> transformation are in place. As far as I can tell, technologies for 
> clean energy have matured to the point where fossil fuels require 
> massive subsidies to remain competitive.

It feels like every week, there is a new study on the falling prices of
renewable energy. Here's one from International Renewable Energy Agency
(IRENA), which Reuters (MAY 29, 2019) quoted the following way:

"Onshore wind and solar PV are set by 2020 to consistently offer a less
expensive source of new electricity than the least-cost fossil-fuel
alternative without financial assistance."

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-renewables-costs/solar-onshore-wind-costs-set-to-fall-below-new-fossil-fuel-energy-report-idUSKCN1SZ1ML

The decline is prices for the generation of renewable energy has
been dramatic and consistent over the last decade. Solar PV prices
have come down about 90% since 2010. Costs for wind and other clean
energy sources have declined significantly as well, though not that
dramatically. These number are easy to find.

This change in costs is the basis for plans like the one Brian
referred to, the investment-driven case for the renewable energy.
But even for the business case, it's clear that this will not happen
without sufficient change in the regulatory environment, aka, state
intervention.


> The climate change movement,particularly around Fridays for Future,
> made strong inroads into the managerial class, whose kids were out
> demonstrating. This made the issues much more concrete and personal
> than diagrams on climate reports.

Since this post had a European view, let me quote the numbers for the
German FFF movement.

52.8% are 14 to 19 years old
43.6% come from the upper middle class

https://www.deutschland.de/en/topic/environment/who-is-behind-fridays-for-future

Add to this that 57.6% are female and Greta Thunberg seems like quite a
good representative of the movement.

I'm not entirely sure how they define here upper middle class, for
Germany the entire middle class is about 65% (defined as 70-200% of
median annual income.) This indicates to me that kids from the upper
middle class, which is typically regarded as the managerial class, are
vastly over-represented. Given that more than half are below 19 years
of age, I assume that most of them still live at home.

Now, of course, I don't know what kind of discussions go on at the
dinner table (should there still be one), but a lot of politicians
mentioned in media interviews that their kids brought these questions
home with more urgency. This is, of course, totally anecdotal and says
nothing about efficacy.

But two theoretical ideas in form my claim. First, taken from Manuel
Castells, that purposeful social change requires social movements as
social actors. And FFF is that and, second, that social change is most
profound when it enters the private sphere. I see this a bit like in the
late 1960s, when kids began to confront their parents/grandparents about
what *they* did during the Nazi period. 

None of this says that this is enough to effect real change, but I think
the creates some of the socio-cultural preconditions for it.


> The notion of climate justice is
> beginning to build bridges between different social movements.

This, as I understand is, is the entire purpose of the green new deal
and marks a substantial change from traditional green politics. And, at
least in the German speaking context, it appears to build bridges into
the unions and the traditional -- industry-oriented -- social democratic
parties. Of course, this is uneven, but it is different from 10 years ago.

Here is also where the character of the energy transition will be
decided. Will it be purely investment-driven and leading to a further
privatization of public infrastructures, or will be renew the sense of
social solidarity and public provision of basic goods.

This is where politics is, outside the self-destructive madness of the
far-right.

> And, extreme weather has became so extreme as a day-to-day reality 
> that cognitive efforts required to ignore are sharply rising. Last
> but not least, the covid-19 economic crisis shifted the conversation
> from whether the state should intervene into the economy to how it
> should be done.

OK, that seems self explanatory.


> In Europe, driven by Germany, this might lead to quite significant 
> changes in policy. It seems, the German government has learned some 
> lessons from the 2008 crises and is not calling for austerity at the 
> periphery, but for a massive investment program, that is at least 
> labelled as a green new deal. What surprises me the most is that
> there is hardly any opposition inside Germany, which will have to
> shoulder the bulk of the costs for this.

OK, this is really a big claim. The basis for this is the difference
between the public discussion in Germany now, compared to 2008. Back
then, it was all about the lazy southerns and the bankrupt Greeks who
want to take "our" money. This totally dominated public discourse. No
amount of pointing out that the money really went to saving German (and
French) banks made any difference, nor did appeals to European
solidarity or the self-interest of an export-led economy.

This is very different now. The main critique of the German/French plan
to raise money on the EU level and provide subsidies, rather than loans,
comes from outside Germany, mainly the Netherlands and Austria and other
small rich countries. Inside Germany, I haven't seen much, neither from
political parties (the far-right is deeply preoccupied with itself), nor
from industry or the unions. I expect a lot of maneuvering over the
coming months, and the end-result might well be disappointing in terms
of what is needed to drastically lower C02 emissions, but the at least
the start of this discussion is very different from how we ended up with
post-2008 austerity.


> There is a race between restarting and transforming the economy. I 
> think structurally, chances are better in Europe (minus UK) than in 
> the rest of the world. Whether the political institutions here in 
> Europe have the will, capacity and power to grab the opportunity, 
> remains to be seen. But the fact that is has been identified and 
> articulated by core actors is reason for some optimism.

Admittedly, none of this makes the claims any less sweeping and sweeping
claims are always speculative. But I think it's necessary to think about
larger patterns, but it's also necessary to make the basis of that
thinking transparent thus open to critique.




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