[MUSIC] Let's keep moving towards answering the key question. What does humanity do to create the best energy transition? We talked in the last lesson about key issues we must address. Major challenges to the narrative of transitioning from today's energy systems to tomorrow's more diverse energy systems. But there are also key questions we must ask in order to keep us focused on developing solutions that actually work. And like everything else to do with the energy transition, the answers are not simple. We can create energy only with resources available to us at a given location. We can look to solar power as a major contributor in the sunniest, driest areas of the world, the Sahara desert and Middle East, Northern Australia and deserts of Asia and North America. However, it's not going to drive energy systems in the upper latitudes. Wind has major power generation potential in the mid continental plains of North and South America and Eurasia. It is not a viable solution in the tropical jungles of Africa and South America or in Southeastern Asia. Hydro power depends on large river flows and big elevation differences. We can access wave and tidal energy only along particular coastlines where they have enough energy. Geothermal power generation requires high geothermal gradients. Although we've seen that direct use geothermal and ground source heat pumps have value in many areas. Energy produced by burning fuels, gas oil, coal, biomass and nuclear can be located near demand centers as long as we can supply the fuel. This applies not only to electrical generation but to direct heat used domestically, commercially and industrially. We saw in the last lesson that the UN Sustainable Development Goals encompass a huge variety of needs and wants for people around the world. All of them dependent on abundant, affordable and reliable energy, but trying to fulfill all these needs leads to conflicting priorities. People in many energy poor countries like Pakistan, India and China have decided that they must build their energy sources as quickly as possible. Which means building coal and gas fired electricity generation as well as lower emissions sources. Well, this strategy addresses many of the Sustainable Development Goals for them, it definitely conflicts with climate action and other environmental issues. We see these conflicts everywhere, in the western United States expanding and reinforcing electrical grids is key to more diverse and reliable electrical power. Addressing sustainable development goals number seven, affordable and clean energy. Number 12, responsible production and consumption and number 13, climate action. Yet some people question whether planned, submerged electrical cables in the Columbia River will harm the environment. Threatening Sustainable Development Goals number six, clean water and sanitation And number 14, life below water. Also in North America and Europe, how do we balance the creation of biomass from wood and crops to address GHG emissions with the negative environmental effects of deforestation and intensive agriculture? Which also removes farmland from food production regardless of people's needs, even humanity's larger needs in terms of the Sustainable Development Goals. We cannot simply ignore the interests and rights of those directly affected by new projects to address those needs. Stakeholders can range from farmers on the land, electricity consumers demanding delivery of reliable, affordable electricity to indigenous people facing potential destruction of their lands, culture and historical ways of life. Sometimes stakeholder interests seem rather trivial. Some would say that having to look at wind turbines in the distance is not really a hardship, but many stakeholder interests are incredibly important for the lives of those affected. In Canada, indigenous peoples have lived on the land for thousands of years and many signed treaties to ensure their rights and ways of life would be honored. Over the past few decades, all Canadians have become more aware of these treaties and rights. And are learning to accept that first nations have a right to be consulted on what happens on their lands and a right to participate as they see fit in resource development. That said, much more remains to be accomplished. There are many other such relationships around the world and we have to ask ourselves, how do we balance stakeholder rights and interests with the desire to build new energy infrastructure or to extract new resources? We'll explore these ideas more fully near the end of the course. Today's energy producing technologies range from those that are thousands of years old, such as fire for heat to new tech that is constantly improving like photovoltaic solar panels. As we've seen throughout the course so far, every energy technology has positive and negative attributes. None are perfect, and none can be applied to every situation. Most technologies are constantly improving, like solar panels that can now collect energy on both sides and move to track the sun. Or internal combustion engines, which deliver more power using less fuel than they previously could. But most of these have efficiency limits dictated by physics, and improvements tend to become less impactful over time s we approach physical limits. There are new and unproven ideas and we don't know what impacts those will have. The idea of nuclear fusion is hardly new, but as the old joke goes, it's been 20 years from perfection for more than 50 years now. If we do perfect nuclear fusion, however, it could be so powerful that it would completely change energy generation around the world. And there are many new ideas for energy storage, some of which could revolutionize that field and boost the contribution of intermittent renewables to the grid. There are ideas out there that aren't even technology, there are ideas to change processes or massively increase efficiency and supply chains. What if a few of those could make a big difference? One reason that most energy analysts provide multiple scenarios on energy supply over the coming decades is that there is so much that we don't know about what technologies and ideas will be successful and revolutionary. Or whether any of the promising ideas of today will end up realizing their potential. How do we ensure energy security for everyone, all of the time? We've seen numerous examples of electricity and fuel supplies being cut off by weather related events, floods, winter storms and forest fires. Well, the timing may be unpredictable. We know that will happen and climate models indicate some will happen more often. More unpredictable our societal events, political unrest can cut off fuel supplies and supply chains. The Russian Ukrainian conflict in 2022 has threatened energy security in European and other nations. And many analysts have faulted poor European energy policy for allowing too much dependence on Russian fuel and commodities. And of course, the global COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted markets and projects everywhere, including plans to build new energy sources. These are four important and very wide ranging questions, everyone must ask when designing concepts, policies and actions towards an effective energy transition. It's not simple, there are many drivers and many questions to answer. Let's turn next to designing concepts, policies and actions. [MUSIC]
