Which way to the front?

Trump's energy policies put America on a road to nowhere

Jim Nuttle illustration from “America’s New Map”

There is no global race to innovate the next-generation gas-combustion engine. That ship has sailed, in historical terms.

But when you try to steer the country through the rearview mirror, this is what you get with the chimera of “the freedom to buy the car of your choice.”

Yes, the world is using more of everything as it continues its growth amidst a rising/risen global majority middle class’s skyrocketing consumption.

But notice what is rising to the top, signaling the future we as a nation should be most interested in dominating in terms of competition. What I see here says we should be gung-ho on renewable energies (RE, rapidly growing absolutely and in share) and bullish on natural gas (growing second-fastest and holding its share).

That’s the global picture. Remembering my dictum that demand — not supply — determines market power, we must ask the logical question of who’s in charge, so to speak?

Well, it’s not the advanced West or the Americas in general, that’s to be sure. Virtually all of this growth is Asia-fueled.

So, no, it really doesn’t matter what we choose to do or not do when it comes to … say, Electric Vehicles (EVs) or RE in general because Asia’s in that driver’s seat, and, choking as they are on fossil fuel pollution, their choice is abundantly clear.

So, yeah, we can race to dominate the energy past by focusing on drill baby drill, but that effectively cedes the future to China.

NYT: Trump’s Retreat From Clean Energy Puts the U.S. Out of Step With the World

There’s really no other way to present Trump 2.0 on energy.

Most major economies are investing in ever-cheaper solar and wind power. The United States risks further ceding a global market to China.

High tech and manufacturing-dependent and related to energy self-sufficiency (and, hence, national security) … seems like an obvious focus, yes?

President Trump’s repudiation of renewable-energy technologies stands to make the United States an outlier in the world.

Many of its large-economy peers are choosing a different path. Even as coal, oil and gas still power the global economy, and more fossil fuels are burned year after year, the movement globally is toward heavy investment in solar, wind and batteries, the prices of which have fallen sharply in recent years.

How this “greatens” the US, I do not fathom. The EU is the most obvious comparable, and look where they’re headed.

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GUARDIAN: ‘Rising star’: EU made more electricity from solar than coal in 2024

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Europe is surging ahead on all manner of RE, while the US falls behind.

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WAPO: Renewables were supposed to take over the grid. Instead they’re falling short. Despite generous tax credits, red tape has slowed wind and solar.

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Moving down the hydrocarbon chain means reducing the most CO2 emissions-heavy energy sources and upping the least (per the IPCC):

1. Petroleum: 2.46 pounds CO2/kWh (1,116 g CO2/kWh)

2. Coal: 2.31 pounds CO2/kWh (1,048 g CO2/kWh)

3. Natural gas: 0.96 pounds CO2/kWh (435 g CO2/kWh)

4. Solar power: ~41 g CO2e/kWh

5. Nuclear power: ~12 g CO2e/kWh

6. Wind power: ~11 g CO2e/kWh

7. Hydropower: ~4 g CO2e/kWh

And, yeah, because of the big drop-off from coal to NG, the latter remains a “good” energy source going forward.

But, what is really going forward is hydrogen, which produces no CO2 during combustion.

It all just depends on how you generate that hydrogen. Certain production methods are pretty bad on emissions (so-called “grey” hydrogen), while others less so (“blue” and “green”).

And we’re not even yet talking about the true “gold standard” of hydrogen, often called gold or white hydrogen:

Gold/white/geologic hydrogen is naturally occurring molecular hydrogen found underground in geological formations. It is formed through natural processes without human intervention, unlike other forms of hydrogen produced in laboratories or industrial settings.

In other words, the pure stuff.

Guess who has plenty of that, per most recent estimates?

That would be us, of course, in yet another example of how blessed this land of ours truly is.

“The US Geological Survey (USGS) published a map showing locations in the United States that may contain significant reserves of “geologic hydrogen,” challenging conventional beliefs about its availability.”

INTERESTING ENGINEERING: 6.2 trillion tons: US hydrogen jackpot could be double than Earth’s gas reserves

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Perhaps unsurprisingly, given the drill baby drill mindlessness to-date, the Trump Administration has evinced no policy preference toward this future energy bonanza.

This map builds on a previous study published last month by USGS researchers, which suggested that untapped hydrogen lying beneath the Earth’s surface could total an astounding 6.2 trillion tons.

Just 2% of this amount could theoretically provide carbon-free fuel for the world for 200 years. “We estimate that the energy content of this recoverable hydrogen is roughly double the energy contained in all the proven natural gas reserves on Earth,” noted authors Geoff Ellis and Sarah Gelman in their recent study in Science Advances.

Understand: we are a ways away from understanding how best to extract geologic hydrogen, but, yeah, you have to believe there’s a solid role for the USG in promoting such research and development.