Royal Dutch Shell, home to several scenario planning pioneers, takes another look into the future of energy and the related climate change challenge. In an open letter distributed in cooperation with Project Syndicate, CEO Jeroen van der Veer sees two major pathways to a possible future of a more sustainable energy mix (i.e. including wind, solar, hydro, bio and nuclear): the scramble way and the blueprints way. In any case, the shift is necessary as it is foreseen that easily accessible oil and gas reserves will most likely not be able to keep up with demand after 2015. In a nutshell :

scramble scenario: nations hurry to secure their energy reserves, local coal & biofuels rise, policy makers basically sit back and wait until things go wrong as energy consumption and and greenhouse-gas emissions are not mitigated, result: spikes & volatility in energy prices. Sounds familiar?

blueprints scenario: new coalitions emerge to tackle energy-, economy- and environment-related challenges together, local authorities/policymakers, industry players and R&D/innovators work together, national governments adjust their instruments (taxes, incentives, standards, etc.) to help curb things in the right direction (especially in terms of buildings, vehicles & transport fuels), at a world level harmonization increases, cars run increasingly on electricity & hydrogen, CO2 is increasingly captured and stored underground

Shell sees the blueprints scenario as the best move in terms of the energy, economy, environment equation, but does mention some requirements for it to succeed.

The approach taken in the blueprints scenario follows a path similar to that in transition management initiatives (Pantopicon is involved in several such projects at the moment, e.g. Plan C), in which common challenges are explored and ideals shared, new cross-boundary coalitions are formed bottom up, innovative pathways to the ideal are explored, experiments are set up, to explore not one but a series of possible solutions and spark innovation, etc. Succesful solutions will be scaled up gradually through society-wide capacity building.

“The world faces a long voyage before it reaches a low-carbon energy system. Companies can suggest possible routes to get there, but governments are in the driver’s seat. And governments will determine whether we should prepare for bitter competition or a true team effort.”

Via Alex over at Worldchanging.org

Related posts:

1. energy islands
2. energy futures in the middle-east
3. sustainable energy

This entry was posted on Tuesday, January 29th, 2008 at 19:01 and is filed under business, foresight, future, society, sustainability, technology. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.