Saul Griffith, an American inventor, entrepreneur and engineer, wrote a book called "electrify everything" which outlines a plan for decarbonising the US. Every time a vehicle is replaced, a building is renovated or an appliance is purchased, the person should buy electric. All new housing needs to be energy efficient and shouldn't have a gas cooker. The only thing required to make this happen is a collective national effort. The kind of long-term loans reminiscent of the government-backed mortgages that created the postwar American middle class could be used to finance it. Is that a question?
There is an answer that is clear, simple and wrong when it comes to complex problems. The person is too smart to be caught in that net. One of the difficulties with his grand plan is that it goes by the abbreviation.
Critical raw materials are what it means. Without secure supplies of certain elements we extract from the Earth's crust, an all-electrical future won't be possible. We are learning that there are a lot of critical elements. This columnist had until recently been unaware that a full roll call goes from antimony to strontium.
Only a small number of theseCRMs were considered critical when people first started to think about a comprehensively electrified future. The EU thought there could be 14 of them. The number went up to 20 by the year's end. It was 27 by year's end. There have been 30CRMs since 2020.
The EU has been worried about this for a long time, but the news of the problem seems to have taken a long time to get to London. There are other important things in the government's mind. An email from the Department for Business, enterprise and Industrial Strategy said that the report of an important inquiry was to be published last Monday. The 76-page PDF contained tables and charts of all descriptions.
Calling for open and global markets for raw materials sounds as fatuous as demanding an open market in Ukrainian wheat just now
The report was commissioned by the British Geological Survey and is now available for inspection. To identify those minerals which might be at risk of supply disruption was the aim of the inquiry.
There are two dimensions to criticality, the likelihood of disruptions to supply and the economic vulnerability of the UK. The threshold for criticality on both axes was reached by 18 of the 26CRMs evaluated. The rare earth elements were among the ones with the highest ratings. China is the leader in the production of 16 of theCRMs. South Africa, Brazil, the US, Russia, and the Democratic Republic of Congo are some of the leading producers of various metals and minerals.
Both supply risks and important vulnerabilities are represented by 18 of theCRMs. The path to its carbon-free future appears to be rocky.
The EU's analysis of itsCRM vulnerabilities has reached broadly similar conclusions and has led to an action plan for open and global markets for raw materials. Considering the importance of China in the area, it makes sense to demand an open market in Ukrainian wheat. The EU has a document that lays out the strategic problem in great detail. Europe is vulnerable due to excessive reliance on single supplier countries. Check to see if it's true. Digital and clean technologies rely on critical raw materials. Check to see if it's true. The green and digital transitions will cause a drastic increase in European demand for certain critical raw materials. Check to see if it's true. So...
There's a document stopping. The logical conclusion is too difficult to articulate. Let's say it out Europe and the US will find themselves in a similar situation as they try to move to a carbon-free future. The shots will now be called by the leader of the free world. The UK is in the same situation as the British Geological Survey says in its report onCRMs.
The lost art of looking at nature is an essay by Rachel Riederer.
The implicit neocolonialism in the west's search for a green future is examined by the Geographies in Transition on the Phenomenal World website.
Facial recognition technology is a toxic technology, so why isn't it banned, is the question Matthew Ryder asked in Losing face.
All Rights Reserved © 2024
