Recently I came across this article which maps out the climate tribes, in other words, different approaches people have to the topic of energy and climate change.
To me, anything other than energy maximalism is not serious for a very simple reason:
we don't know what kind of technology awaits us at higher levels of energy per capita, in other words, what the technology tree looks like at these higher energy levels, but to a first approximation, energy per capita usage is directly related to the standard of living.
Thus, our civilization should be maximising the gradient of Henry-Adams curve and by extension, Kardashev scale gradient (although I am more fond of a related microdimensional mastery Barrow scale)
Just as a reminder: Arthur C. Clarke was imagining nuclear catalysts in the 2020s, transmutation in the 2040s and space-time distortion by 2060s - for any one of these, a lot more energy is needed.
We need more technology, not money.
P.S. If someone is worried that we might heat up the planet too much, here is a Physics 101 reality check:
- Humans use about about 170 PWh (10^15 Wh) per year
- This corresponds to a constant energy flux of 19.5 TW (10^12 W)
- The area of Earth is 5.10 * 10^14 m²
- Thus, the human-caused energy flux per m² is 0.04 W/m²
- The total downwelling radiation at the surface, shortwave (solar) plus longwave (thermal radiation from the atmosphere) is about 500 W/m² and the human contribution is 0.04 W/m2...
- If we were to increase the energy usage 2 orders of magnitude (100 times), it would still be less than 1% of natural warming