London Business School Energy Club presents: the renewables revolution

Renewable energy is not a controversial topic in its own right (unless you’re a climate change denier or a part of the fossil fuel lobby, especially on the coal side). It’s a controversial topic along the lines of disruption of powerful, established, entrenched industries (mostly mining and petrochemicals) and also along the lines of disruption of life(style) as we know it. Most of us in the West (the proverbial First World, even if it doesn’t feel like one very often) want to live green, sustainable, environmentally-friendly lifestyles… as long as the toughest environmental sacrifice is ditching a BMW / Merc / Lexus etc. for a Tesla, and swapping paper tissues for bamboo-based ones (obviously I am projecting here, but I don’t think I’m that far off the mark). Us Westerners (if not “we mankind”, quoting Taryn Manning’s character from “hustle and flow”) love to consume, love the ever-expanding choices, love all the conveniences we can afford – the prospect of cutting down on hot water, not being able to go on overseas holidays once or twice a year, or not replacing our mobiles whenever we feel like it, is an unpleasant one. Renewables, with their dependency on weather (wind, solar) and generally less abundant (or at least less easily and immediately abundant) output are an unpleasant reminder that the time of abundance (when, quoting Michael Caine’s character from “Interstellar”, “every day felt like Christmas”) might be coming to an end.

Furthermore, even for a vaguely educated Westerner like myself, renewables are a source of certain cognitive dissonance. On one hand we have several consecutive hottest years on record, floods, wildfires, disrupted weather patterns, environmental migrants, the prospect of ice-free Arctic ocean, Extinction Rebellion etc. – on the other hand we have seemingly very upbeat news like “Britain goes week without coal power for first time since industrial revolution”, “Fossil fuels produce less than half of UK electricity for first time”, or “Renewable electricity overtakes fossil fuels in the UK for first time”. So in the end, I don’t know whether we’re turning the corner as we speak, or not.

There is no shortage of credible statistics out there – it’s quite a challenge for a non-energy expert to understand them. According to BP, renewables (i.e. solar, wind and other renewables) accounted for approx. 9.3% of global electricity generation in 2018 (25% if we add hydroelectric). Then, as per the World Bank (spreadsheets with underlying data from Renewable Energy), in 2016 all renewables accounted for approx. 11% of global energy generation (35% if we add hydroelectric). Then, as per IEA, in 2018 renewables accounted for measly 2% of total energy production (rising to 12% if we add biomass and waste, and to 15% if we add hydro).

2% looks tragic, 9.3% looks poor, 25% or 35% looks at least vaguely promising – but no matter which set of stats we choose, fossil fuels still account for vast majority of global energy generation (and the demand is constantly rising). Consequently, my anxiety remains well justified. It was the reason I went to the event in the first place – to find out what the future holds.

The panellists were:

• Equinor, Head of Corporate Financing & Analysis, Anca Jalba
• Glennmont Partners, Founding Partner, Scott Lawrence
• Globeleq, Head of Renewables, Paolo de Michelis
• Camco, Managing Director, Geoff Sinclair

The panellists made a wide range of observations, depending on their diverse geographical focus and nature of their companies. You will find a summary below, coupled with my personal observations and comments. I intentionally anonymized the speakers’ comments.

One of the panellists remarked that in the last decade a cost of 1MW of solar panels went from EUR 6-8m to EUR 3.5m to EUR 240k, and at the same time ESG went from being a niche area in investment management to being very much at the core (I echo the latter from my own observations). At the same time, according to research, in order to meet Paris Accord targets, by 2050 50% of global energy will need to come from renewables. So no matter which set of abovementioned statistics we choose, we’re globally nowhere near 50%.

The above comments are probably fairly well known, sort of goes without saying. However, the speakers made a whole lot of more targeted observations.

The concept of distributed renewables (individual households generating their own electricity, mostly using solar panels on their roofs, and feeding surplus into the power grid) was mentioned. This is being encouraged by some governments, and the speakers noted that governments are the key players in reshaping the energy landscape. They were also quite candid on there being a lot of rent seeking behaviour in the (established) energy sector (esp. utility companies). Given the size and influence of the utility sector, it is fairly understandable that they may have mixed feelings towards activities that may effectively undercut them. At the same time, one would hope that at least some of them see the changes coming, and appreciate their necessity and inevitability by adapting rather than opposing. Interestingly, emerging markets where energy infrastructure and power generation are not very reliable were mentioned as an opportunity for off-grid renewables.

We were also reminded that electricity generation is just part of the energy mix. It’s a massive part, of course, but there is also automotive transport, aviation, and shipping – all of which consume vast amounts of energy, with very few low-carbon or no-carbon options. Electric vehicles are a promising start (not without their own issues though: cobalt mining), but aviation and shipping do not currently have viable non-fossil-fuel-based options (except perhaps biofuels, but I doubt there is enough arable land in the whole world to plant enough biofuel-generating crops to feed the demands of aviation and shipping).

The need for (truly) global carbon tax was also raised. I think (using tax havens as reference) it may be challenging to implement, but, unlike corporate domicile and taxation, energy generation is generally local, so if governments would tax emissions physically produced by utility companies within their borders, that could be more feasible. Then again, it could be quite disruptive and thus challenging politically (think the fight around coal mining in the US or gillet jeunes in France as examples).

On the technical side, intermittency risk is a big factor in renewables, and energy storage is not there yet on an industrial scale. It is a huge investment opportunity.

In terms of new sources of renewable energy, floating offshore wind farms were mentioned as the potential next big thing, even though it is currently not commercially viable. My question about the panellists’ views on feasibility of fusion power was met with scepticism.

In terms of investment opportunities, one of the speakers (prompted by my question) mentioned that climate change adaptation is also one. This echoes exactly what Mariana Mazzucato said at the British Library event some time ago (pls see my post “Mariana Mazzucato: the value of everything” for reference), so there might be something there. More broadly, there seemed to be a consensus among the speakers once subsidies disappear, only investors will large balance sheets and portfolios of projects will be in the position to compete, given capital-intensive nature of energy infrastructure.

I ended by asking a question about the inevitability and scale of impact of the climate change on the world as we know it and on our lifestyles. I didn’t get a very concrete reply other than there *will be* impact, and adaptation will be essential. It hasn’t lifted my spirit, but I don’t think I was expecting a different answer. In the end, it looks like the renewables are currently more of an evolution than revolution. Evolution is better than nothing; it might just not be enough.