Survey – What Will Happen in the Next Five Years?
This month, we’re asking you to go out on a limb and predict the future. Please rate your level of agreement that each of the following will happen in the next five years:
1. In the United States, a new administration will make deep cuts in the powers of the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Energy, peeling back decades of regulation.[merlic_poll id=”23417″]
2. Extreme weather conditions will convince even the global climate change deniers/skeptics that the theory is essentially correct and that it represents a compelling reason for the international community to take the actions necessary to avert catastrophe.[merlic_poll id=”23418″]
3. Peak oil will cause a spike in gasoline prices, greatly accelerating the adoption rate for electric transportation.[merlic_poll id=”23420″]
4. A deep global recession, rooted in the financial mistakes we’re seeing in our current news, will cause a great reduction in the demand for energy, reducing the imperative to change our energy policies.[merlic_poll id=”23421″]
5. The cost of photovoltaics will fall to the point at which the proposition to homeowners and commercial/industrial businesses becomes attractive, even without subsidies.[merlic_poll id=”23422″]
6. Instability in the Middle East will escalate into war, causing a major interruption in the supply of oil, and massive shortages at the pump.[merlic_poll id=”23423″]
7. Battery technology will improve to the point that the basic consumer proposition associated with electric transportation (i.e., price and range) will be appealing to the mainstream.[merlic_poll id=”23424″]
8. Other nations will follow the precedent set by Germany, Japan, and Italy, and nuclear power will start to be phased out on an ever-broadening basis.[merlic_poll id=”23425″]
9. Some technology currently considered science fiction (e.g., cold fusion) will receive a surprising up-tick in legitimacy, sparking hopes for abundant, clean, and inexpensive energy.[merlic_poll id=”23426″]
* When you have completed the survey, please click here, and enter a sentence or two (more if you like) that summarizes your vision of the most likely to happen in the next five years.
The tariff on Chinese Solar panels in the USA will slow the installation of PV in the USA. Battery technology will grow and become more main steam, The introduction of grafine will have a major impact on these two areas of Solar and Battery technology. The only reason these areas are allowed to grow is due to the powerst that be saw this as no real soltution. If other thecnologies are given the same freedom, major energy breackthroughs would occur. However, there will be major breakthroughs in new types of energy generation, however it is still questionable if the powers to be will allow these technologies to become mainstream.
The issues with the Japanese Nuclear tragedy will have more and more of an impact on the world as it starts to kill the ocean and heads to the USA. With what has happen with Shale gas, I see the USA being less of a leader in renewable energy. Staying focused on Carbon fuels. However with the increasing population in developing countries and the need for food, water and just the basics of energy. This will become more and more of the push for electrical solutions. The world because of funding the the world being bankrupt major changes in life styles will strart to occur within the next 5 years. The world will be come more basic.
Electric vehicles will become more popular. Hybrids will become longer and longer ranged on electric, Trains and semi-trucks will go to CNG. Solar will grow exponentially as the economical methods of constructing them are brought into production Huge rural solar installations will make water breakdown into hydrogen which will replace much of the natural gas from wells by simply pumping it into the natural gas pipelines. the pipelines and fuel cell systems will power our homes but our cars will be battery for safety and ease of operation. many electric utility companies will cease rural operations where piped in hydrogen gas will replace their wires outside of town. Household air conditioning will cease to use the Freon system in favor of the much more efficient water and brine systems already in use in New York since the 1920’s when they used steam and now we will use Solar heat to cool the homes in the sunbelt (For more on how that works just ask me.)
It seems that surveys like these will only serve to show the power of the PR machine behind various technologies – such as EV’s or PV cells – rather than telling us anything at all about the true likelihood of any of these future events.
I’m not sure that there’s any benefit to monitoring the hype. A poll of experts is useful… but a poll of people who subscribe to a green energy newsletter concerning their belief in green energy propaganda (this word is accurate, it is not intended to be loaded)? What are you trying to determine here Craig?
Well, there is no doubt that there are flaws here, if we’re trying to infer the truth, i.e., the most likely scenario for the year 2017. You name one such defect, i.e., we’re essentially breathing our own exhaust. Another is that this is hardly a random selection of people. But if nothing else, it fleshes out readers’ understanding of the issues, and fortifies commitment to the cause of sustainability.
A comment on the question ” Battery technology will improve to the point that the basic consumer proposition associated with electric transportation (i.e., price and range) will be appealing to the mainstream”
I own an electric car and it is great for around-town driving, but I don’t see the advances needed for even a 300 mile trip anytime in the next 10 years. That would require battery technology improvement to tripple the range AND enough proliferation of FAST CHARGERS for there to be on at the destination of your trip. The 3X range improvement may occur within 10 years (though upgrading my car would cost around $9,000), but to date there is not a single FAST CHARGER on the entire East Coast.
The situation is even bleaker for an 800 mile trip in an EV.
So, I believe an EV for in-town and a gasoline or natural gas car for trips will be necessary for a long time.
Absent a comprehensive energy policy that focuses on renewables and sustainability it’s hard to make what one might call an educated guess. Given the short term demands of institutional investors it’s somewhat of a discouraging scenario, but we would hope that despite the inevitable mistakes of subsidizing “selected industries” there will be adequate funding and finance to grow an industry that reduces our use of fossil fuels.