Breakthrough Institute and The Politics of Limits

The Interchange is an interesting renewable energy/renewables business podcast by GreenTech Media, and the most controversial podcast I've heard so far is an interview with Breakthrough Institute's Alex Trembath.

Some thoughts:

• Alex says they've consciously decided to be less critical of mainstream environmental groups, less obnoxious and rock-throwing, and good for them for this change. There are some times when obnoxious rock-throwing is appropriate - that wasn't the case regarding past BI behavior, so it's good that they've changed it and are willing to say they've decided to change it.

• Alex rightly says the environmental movement prior to 2004 (when the Breakthrough guys started doing their thing) had a much stronger emphasis on limits to growth then it does today, but is wrong to say there was something wrong about that. I'm sure plenty of people back then realized solar and wind costs were dropping dramatically, but I don't know if anyone would've said you can count on renewable energy being cheaper than fossil fuels, even without subsidies or accounting for externalities. That meant some type of limit was a necessary argument back then for energy issues (and remains a component of many other environmental issues).

• He goes on to argue that limits to growth and saying no in general is a bad political tactic. I'm open to that argument but I'm not sure what BI is doing with it or backing it up with solid research (might be a little unfair to demand that of a podcast).

• Alex says BI started off with a focus on renewables and EVs. That's sure not how I remember it, which was nuclear power all the time. He says they're now into nuclear as well. Yep.

• He claims power systems get unstable with renewables are 50% of the total. I thought we were over that, and the discussion really is 80% versus 100%.

• Alex makes an unnecessary dig at energy efficiency, with the Jevons Paradox etc.  That's a miss - I think the political economy vastly underestimates the unsexy value of efficiency, the complete opposite of what he was saying.

All in all, too much techno-optimism, but it could be worse, and BI seems to be moving in a better direction. It's less clear to me whether they have the chops to make any real contribution, though.