The word 'resiliency' is one of the more overused words in the wake of the pandemic. Things that were disrupted because of lack of proper investment include our supply chains that move goods around the world. It is not just global pandemics that cause major crises along these supply chains.
Carbon neutrality in the energy system is not the end of the use of natural gas, but it will result in the shift of focus on the use of natural gas from energy to production. If done correctly, this will not mean a /reduction/ in the work available. But, it will mean a shift in the focus of where that work happens. However, a redirection in the focus of work and investment is very problematic for current revenue programs of industry leading companies in Canada.
Efficiency of transport and storage is what is going to drive the cost of energy. This is because of our continued limited capacity to generate non-emitting electricity and that we do not use electricity only where it is produced.
There is some new research about the drag on the economy of climate change. The new research questions the validity of previous studies which seemed to not attempt to model the direct effect of increased temperatures. This one looks at those in conjunction with temperature, extreme heat, extreme precipitation, and extreme wind effects on the economy.
The push for commodification of carbon and the establishment of carbon markets has warped our understanding of investment and workable solutions to climate change. Nowhere is this clearer than in the Carbon Capture and Storage discussion.
The classical economic concept of profit on transfer helps to explain why the redistribution of wealth that has occurred because of imperialism is rather difficult to address via the protocols constructed to deal with climate change. International agreements are going to have to go beyond simply supporting direct foreign investment as a solution to developing country energy transition to lower carbon energy solutions. A process that does this fairly is near impossible under the current economic model.
In the war against climate change, the main issue continue to be resource allocation. It is not so much that we do not know how to solve the problems we have created for ourselves, it is that we cannot agree on how to spend the money or even if we have the money to spend. These questions are political, but the facts are rooted in our understanding of the economy and the processes that drive value creation. The politics tend to come out of how you answer the economic question of resource allocation and how you think those resources are created in the first place.
