The Guardian proves that renewables are not, in fact, cheaper

One of the proofs of a reasonable - even reasoned - worldview is that it is consistent. If a means b then that is required to hold over different applications of that insistence that a means b. If in one application it is instead insisted that no, a does not mean b then this is not a reasoned worldview it is, instead, just the two year old shrieking for what it wants.

India is attempting to do something the world has never seen before. So claimed Niti Aayog, the government of India’s policy thinktank, earlier this year. It said that no major economy has tried to expand GDP nearly eightfold within a generation while simultaneously redirecting its energy and industrial systems to reach net zero within two generations. Hence its detailed report’s claim that there is “no historical precedent”.

There is something to this. China industrialised at vast scale, but not on a sustainable net zero path. Korea, Japan and Europe became wealthy by industrialising before decarbonising. Today, rich nations have already satisfied the basic demands of their people and created the infrastructure and high per-capita energy use that India is still trying to build. The world’s most populous country has to do this while also reducing emissions.

This is easier. For renewables are cheaper than fossil fuels, as we all know. Or, at least, as The Guardian continually tells us they are. Therefore, if you’ve something akin to terra nullius in your energy system renewables is obviously the way to go. Why even think about building out that more expensive fossil system? Just leapfrog to that more efficient, cheaper, renewables one in the one step.

As with landline telecoms. It became wholly clear a couple of decades back that those countries that were not wired with telephone landlines never would be. Building out a mobile system was obviously cheaper and so that’s the way those currently untelecommed would become telecommed.

If it is true that a renewables-based grid is cheaper than a fossil fuel one - that insistence that keeps being rammed down our own throats - then India’s task of energy provision at Net Zero is easier, not more difficult. For, the first statement, the a, means that b ineluctably follows, that building out an energy grid for the first time is cheaper and better done with renewables than with fossil fuels. Equally, the logic insists that if we now say that from unelectrified to powered is more difficult, more expensive, in Net Zero fashion, then renewables are not cheaper than fossil fuels, are they?

If a means b then a does mean b in different cases. If renewables are cheaper then building a grid for the first time in Net Zero, not fossil, fashion is cheaper. If the complaint is that this is not true then on at least one side of that a means b argument folk are just making stuff up, right?

The actual answer is, of course, that renewables are not cheaper than fossil fuels. If they were then we’d not even have a climate change problem in the first place - everyone would just be naturally scrambling for the now cheaper option and the problem would go away. Which does mean that every plan, every insistence, every fine and policy imposed is proof that renewables are not cheaper. Could even still be worthwhile, but not cheaper.

Tim Worstall