TRANSITION, PIÈGE À CON ? – JEAN-BAPTISTE FRESSOZ

Full Transcript

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lO0r5O4-2wU

[00:15] ARCADIA.
[00:17] ARCADIA THE ECOLOGICAL TRANSITION.
[00:23] Welcome to Arcadia, for this conference.
[00:25] which is part of our cycle about energy transition.
[00:28] let us welcome Jean-Baptiste Fressoz.
[00:30] who is an historian of sciences, technologies and environment.
[00:34] He is also a researcher at CNRS.
[00:36] He notably wrote the book "The Happy Apocalypse".
[00:38] and coauthored "The shock of the Anthropocene".
[00:41] And Jean-Baptiste, you are going to talk about energy transition issues.
[00:45] Over to you.
[00:47] Thank you Julien, I wanted to start with a little video.
[00:50] to get right away in the mood of what I am going to talk about.
[01:54] So, I imagine that Areva would be suprised to see that they have free advertisement on Le Média.
[02:02] No, more seriously, this ad is really interresting for many reasons.
[02:07] But there is one fundamental reason, it is that it reflects well enough our common perception of the history of energy.
[02:13] There is one thing that is crucial in this ad, it is that we have a history of energy funded upon energy transitions.
[02:21] It goes from an energy system to another, we can see it.
[02:25] So during Antiquity, if I reckon well, it is sail, so wind power.
[02:29] Then during the Middle Ages, it becomes water power.
[02:33] The industrial revolution, indeed, in England with coal.
[02:37] Oil in the USA, with a drive-in theater.
[02:40] And then comes the blessed times of nowadays, since there is a scene where the sky is very grey, spoiled by pollution when this is England,
[02:47] and we come to the contemporary world, which happens, we can imagine, in a mythified Rio de Janeiro,
[02:56] where one mainly parties, and since we have energy...
[03:00] So we have a mix of wind, solar and obviously nuclear
[03:03] since it is an ad for Areva which, incidentally, has been made in 2011, at a time when Areva goes wrong after Fukushima.
[03:12] Hence this necessity to re-enrol in a kind of big history of progress and to set up a history of energy in a history of progress.
[03:20] Thus, this history of energy, funded upon the notion of transition, it is the topic I would like to discuss and tackle through a little more crafted history about our energy past.
[03:34] If there is one thing that the history of energy teaches us, It is that there never was an energy transition in the past.
[03:44] This is, in the end, the bad news, that we can learn from the history of energy.
[03:50] It is that this energy transition that we delight in, that we want to happen, that needs to happen urgently essencially for climate reasons, there is no precedent.
[04:00] The fundamental point is that, contrarily to what Areva tells us, we don't go from an energy system to another.
[04:06] Said differently, we don't go, for example, from wood to coal, then from coal to oil, the from oil to something else that would be nuclear, wind, solar, renewable, etc.
[04:17] We only additionned energy sources in the past the ones upon the others.
[04:22] – Thank you Julien for the slide –
[04:24] That is exactly what this slide shows.
[04:27] You have the CO2 emissions from diverse energy sources.
[04:34] And we see for example, that coal CO2 emissions have never been higher than now.
[04:40] So we don't go from an energy mix wood, then coal, the oil.
[04:45] We go from an energy mix wood then wood-coal then wood-coal-oil.
[04:51] At this moment renewables, they only add up a little layer of primary energy upon an energy mix which still fundamentally relies on carbon.
[05:02] The crucial point we need to keep in mind
[05:03] is that we have a vision too – how to put it –
[05:07] "phasist" of history of technologies.
[05:08] As if we went from a technology to another.
[05:10] In fact, if we look for real what is history of technologies.
[05:13] we can see that history of technologies is fundamentaly additive.
[05:16] We add technological levels on one another, and that is especially true for energy technologies
[05:23] as we never burnt as much coal and oil as now.
[05:27] The energy mix lies at 85% on fossils;
[05:32] on coal and oil.
[05:34] So, on 19th and 20th century technologies.
[05:38] The coal spike isn't the 19th century.
[05:41] It is not even the 1950'.
[05:43] It may be now, nobody knows.
[05:46] We don't know at all.
[05:48] The idea that we are now getting out of coal for electricity,
[05:53] it is something wanted, wished,
[05:55] put on paper, for example during the COP 21.
[05:59] But in fact, we are unable to predict what is going to happen in India,
[06:03] in Pakistan, in Africa with the economic growth.
[06:06] It is not impossible at all that emissions linked to coal combustion increase.
[06:12] I am going to give you an example that seems revealing to me.
[06:15] It is a mine that made a fuss in Australia: the Carmichael mine.
[06:20] I don't know if you heard about this mine.
[06:20] It made a fuss because to extract coal from it it will be necessary to drill the Great Barrier Reef.
[06:29] That, indeed, made every environmentalist flinch and even further.
[06:34] But, to tell the truth, the fundamental point is not to drill a hole in the barrier reef.
[06:37] It is that this only mine in Australia should extract, when it will be running, 60 million metric tons of coal.
[06:45] So 60 million metric tons of coal a year, we cannot figure what it represents.
[06:50] To get a rough estimate, it happens that there is one example that speaks for itself.
[06:53] It is the coal spike in England in 1911.
[06:59] The period when we extract the most coal in England, it's 200 million tons.
[07:03] In the whole England.
[07:03] The whole United Kingdom should I say.
[07:05] With one single mine in Australia, where there only will be several hundreds workers, we will extract as much coal as England at the beginning of the 20th century when there were around a million miners.
[07:17] Si we really have considerable amounts of coal, indeed, in stock.
[07:23] Coal is very abundantly used to produce electricity.
[07:27] Si there is no reason to think about a quick transition.
[07:30] China, which has been the main reason for the increase of coal these last thirty years, China estimates reaching its CO2 emission cap in 2030.
[07:45] So that cause many problems... Because when we look, roughly, at the national level, the Chinese government commits to do many important things when it comes to international conferences.
[07:54] And then after, at the level of Chinese provinces, the central government give really ambitious targets regarding unemployment, economic growth, to each province.
[08:04] And one of the best ways to fulfil these tagets for the province governors, is to do buildings.
[08:10] There is this one thing that works great to employ the population, it is to build infrastructures, and even more infrastructures.
[08:15] And ciment and building are tremendously energy consuming and CO2 emitting.
[08:18] And the energy often comes from coal.
[08:24] We have a really manifest issue that is, on the one hand, political and social stability in China, and on the other hand, CO2 emissions.
[08:32] And then if chinese companies that are specialized in the production of coal-based power, of coal-fired power station, decide to downsize their investment in China, all the capital invested in know-hows, in technologies, then we have to use them.
[08:47] So concretely what is going to happen.
[08:49] We have tons of projects that are at study in Pakistan, in Ethiopia, in Africa in general.
[08:54] So, we really don't have any reason to believe that we're going to reach the coal spike.
[09:01] So I will not even talk about oil, obviously.
[09:03] Since oil, even if there are moments we think about
[09:07] Reaching a plateau in terms of consumption and extraction of oil.
[09:11] Actually, we know there are still tremendous reserves.
[09:14] In particular north of Siberia.
[09:17] I recommend to you a book by Jean-Michel Valantin entitled "Géopolitique d'une planète déréglée".
[09:22] He wrote absolutely fascinating pages
[09:24] pages about what is happening in the Siberian Far North.
[09:27] With absolutely gigantic investments, particularly coming from China,
[09:31] in order to develop immense oil platforms north of Russia.
[09:40] Another example that seems striking to me showing that we are still living, in the end,
[09:45] a development that fundamentally rests upon fossil,
[09:49] is that last summer, in August 2017, an absolutely crucial event
[09:56] in the history of globalization took place.
[09:58] It is the first time a commercial ship
[10:02] passes through the Siberian north to reach Asia.
[10:08] From Europe to Asia without going thourgh the Suez Canal but going through the Far North.
[10:12] That is obviously tied to Global Warming
[10:16] that this route is exploitable without an iceboat.
[10:19] This ship was called... Have you any idea how it was called ?
[10:23] - Santa Maria, no ? - No, the Christophe de Margerie
[10:26] Christophe de Margerie, former CEO of Total,
[10:29] who died in a plane crash in Russia.
[10:32] Why ? Because it is a gas carrier.
[10:34] So a ship that conveys millions of cubic meters
[10:38] of liquid methane
[10:39] and which will allow the major economic development,
[10:44] in all likelihood, of the north of Russia.
[10:44] So, with these few examples
[10:50] of recent energetic additions, in terms of fossil fuels,
[10:54] show particularly that, obviously, we are not out of fossils at all.
[10:58] That for, roughly thirty years, we are talking about climate change
[11:02] and about energy transition, the global energy-mix,
[11:05] roughly, we were at 88% of fossils in the 1980'.
[11:09] We are at 87% now.
[11:09] That is to say it is perfectly stable.
[11:12] And then secondly, what is important to keep in mind, is that in these climate change and energy transition issues, it should be noted that there is not one planet, there is not one single mankind, responsible and impacted as a whole by this climate change.
[11:27] Instead we have profound inequalities, winners and losers.
[11:31] And Russia is obviously part of the winners of climate change.
[11:34] Since this climate change will allow to bring out prodigious natural ressources which are additionaly only worsening the problem.
[11:41] So, these examples, show well that we are still, in the end, fully into fossil fuels.
[11:46] Most importantly, we cannot expect that the oil spike gets us out of trouble.
[11:51] That is to say, there is a discourse, that often comes from degrowthers which is to say that anyway we are going to reach natural limits.
[12:00] We don't have enough oil to carry on the economic development as we know it.
[12:05] It is most likely true long term, but medium term which is the one that interests for issues of climate change, that is false.
[12:11] We realize there is still a lot of junk to burn.
[12:13] And we have absolutely considerable reserves of oil still under our feet.
[12:20] A figure, maybe... Yes?
[12:22] I was wondering if there were anyway examples when there was a major energetic shift and if there are maybe surprising examples...
[12:30] Yes, sure, I just end on this point.
[12:34] But roughly, to not get above the famous two degrees in 2100, it is necessary to let under our feet three quarters of proven reserves of oil, gas, and coal.
[12:48] If you want, the fundamental problem is not a problem about having not enough energy, not enough fossil fuels and that will result in the spike.
[12:54] That really was the big fear of environmentalists in the 1970'.
[12:58] We realize that with the issue of climate change, in the end, the climate wall comes much earlier than the resource wall.
[13:04] So that does not mean there never was an energy transition.
[13:06] And indeed, Julien is right to underline the fact that there was, throughout history, brutal and sudden energy transitions.
[13:14] But unfortunately this is not nice to see.
[13:17] If we want to take concrete examples, moments of big decrease of CO2 emissions are moments of major economic crises.
[13:24] The Great Depression, is a period when, globally, CO2 emissions decrease steeply.
[13:30] The second World War, for the losing countries, for example Germany in 1945 has a magnificent energy transition, but well...
[13:37] We have two more recent examples which are more interesting.
[13:42] These are the cases of Cuba and North Korea.
[13:46] Two really different countries.
[13:48] Under communist regimes, but really different anyway.
[13:51] Which are confronted to the same issue, namely, in 1992, they are denied cheap oil that USSR was providing them to assure their geopolitical influence.
[14:03] And these two countries are making very distinct choices.
[14:06] The most dramatic case is the one of North Korea, since it had an agriculture very intensive in inputs, in fertilizers and in pesticides that are very energy-hungry.
[14:16] And then the North Korean government made the choice to supply its military industrial complex with power.
[14:22] That led to a disaster, well, a huge food shortage.
[14:25] We do not know exactly how many people died but estimates are around 5% and 10% of the North Korean population that passed away in about ten years.
[14:32] So really, a big demographic catastrophe.
[14:35] The other example is a bit more reassuring but not that much.
[14:39] It is the example of Cuba.
[14:41] Cuba then, same issue, they profited from a cheap oil coming from USSR and in 1992, they came in what we call "El Periodo especial", the special period.
[14:54] A period of profound economical crisis, of true suffering also for Cubans.
[15:00] We estimate that Cubans, as a result of this major economic change, of being deprived of cheap oil, or anyway of having much less oil, lost an average of 5kg per individual.
[15:13] So it can be seen through the body of Cubans.
[15:15] CO2 emissions haved decreased, if I reckon well, of 60%.
[15:18] So that is not bad, but it is less than we need to.
[15:22] We, to not exceed the 2 degrees in 2100,
[15:25] we should cut 80% of our CO2 emissions.
[15:27] In wealthy countries and in France in particular.
[15:29] So it is really something massive we need to do.
[15:31] So in Cuba, they did less, still they lost a lot a weight.
[15:35] These was a positive aspect, it is that cardiovascular diseases have sharply decreased.
[15:38] Many epidemiologist are studying the Cuba case.
[15:41] to see what an energy transition is concretely doing
[15:43] in terms of public health.
[15:44] Because Cubains have walked a lot more, used bike...
[15:47] Well, they had to profoundly transform their economy.
[15:50] Si this special period, ended when
[15:52] Cuba got support from Venezuela
[15:55] and cheap oil, badly refined by the way,
[15:58] Which led to a series of environmental issues.
[16:01] Let's say that they went out of this special period
[16:06] at the beginning of the 2000'.
[16:08] So, truely we should be careful about this concept of energy transition.
[16:11] It is a bit the meaning of this introduction.
[16:13] That is to say, this really unanimist concept,
[16:16] I mean, who's against a ecological transition?
[16:19] The ministry as of now is called "Ministry for the Ecological and Inclusive Transition".
[16:22] Everybody agrees, it is very, very kind.
[16:23] There is a naive viewpoint to this.
[16:25] But we need to concretely see what means a true energy transition.
[16:29] We need to see that what we hope for...
[16:32] Actually never happened.
[16:35] We cannot refer to an example from the past and say:
[16:37] There, we should do it that way.
[16:39] And that is something very, very profound.
[16:43] So why should we be careful with this phrase of energy transition?
[16:46] This point is a little more specific.
[16:49] We need to see where it comes from.
[16:51] As a historian, I like to know where do concepts that hang around come from, that move around and then suddenly win the support of the many.
[17:00] The first occurences of the phrase "transition energétique" are in English: "energy transition".
[17:06] It is in English, in the 1970', in 1973 precisely.
[17:09] And what is interesting is to see that it replaces another phrase.
[17:12] A phrase that is much more problematic and which was that of "energy crisis".
[17:18] Or "energy gap".
[17:21] These two phrases were used a lot after 1972, 1973, following the oil shock.
[17:26] And then there was the realization that the US had passed their conventionnal oil spike.
[17:31] We need to get back to these years 1973-1974, under the presidency of Jimmy Carter, at a time when there was a real fear linked to the energy supply of the US.
[17:42] Jimmy Carter, the US president, made several speeches to the nation.
[17:47] You know, these big, solemnel speeches at the White House.
[17:50] On the theme of energy transition.
[17:52] If I reckon well, we have a very famous speech which is called "The malaise speech".
[17:57] A ultra-depressing speech.
[17:58] Really surprising to see that the american president does such a mood-killer speech.
[18:05] I think it is in 1973, when he explains that we cannot continue this way.
[18:09] That the american identity has completely been perverted by consumerism.
[18:13] That now, Americans are defined by what they own and not by what they are and the christian values of puritan work, etc.
[18:20] So a really guild-inducing speech towards American.
[18:24] He explains that Americans will most likely need to give up on individual cars, take the bus again and the collective transportation.
[18:29] So, a very pessimistic speech on the economical future.
[18:33] We are really in an atmosphere almost... apocalyptic would be too strong but anyway quite depressed, let's say, in the US.
[18:41] This discourse about energy transition first comes against this anxiety, this fear, this really really strong mental distress which is link to the energy shortage.
[18:51] The energy transition discourse is to say: we got solutions.
[18:55] Don't worry, there are technological solutions, economical solutions, we are going to handle it.
[19:00] It is in order to make this issue manageable and turn this problem of energy crisis, which is an existencial problem for developped enconomies, in a simple management problem of economic development.
[19:13] What is interresting to see, is that in the beginning, energy transition, in the first texts, which comes from the US energy administration by the way, from a three-sided commission, organization that regroups
[19:24] Western Europe, the USA and Japan.
[19:27] Sweden's Minister of the Future, which is very good at prospecting in the long run.
[19:32] And so, these institutions are everything but environmental.
[19:34] These are rather the spearheads of the developped and industrialized West who are looking to manage Earth ressources.
[19:41] These institutions explain that energy transition is first nuclear power.
[19:47] Basically it is, really, to make big investments in the nuclear energy.
[19:50] At this point, there are reports, the european commission that explains that energy transition in Europe is all about doing a shift toward nuclear energy that will allow to give back a energy sovereignty to the European community.
[20:04] It is oil and fraction gas already and even worse, the transformation of coal into oil.
[20:12] So coal liquefaction is without the shadow of a doubt the most dreadful technology in terms of CO2 emissions we can think of.
[20:18] It consists in taking coal and turning it with a lot of energy coming from coal into liquid fuel.
[20:22] It is a technology
[20:26] which had been develop by nazi Germany
[20:28] because it was affraid of being cut from oil supplies.
[20:32] So this was an autarcik technology of war
[20:35] which could make sense in this context.
[20:39] But which obviously has no sens in the 1970'
[20:41] in Western Europe or the US.
[20:44] So here is what energy transition is.
[20:45] By the bye, the fact that it is nuclear power,
[20:49] I have no evidence of it but it is that "energy transition"
[20:51] means something in nuclear physics.
[20:52] It is an electron going from a state to another around an atom.
[20:54] I cannot tell much more about this.
[20:56] But this is firstly a nuclear physics term.
[20:58] So, it is not impossible at all that nuclear-friendly atom engineers that coined,
[21:04] in the end, in the common discourse and in our way of thinking
[21:09] this term of "energy transition". Which is once more
[21:12] very problematic since historically
[21:13] it doesn't refer to anything.
[21:13] So, does it mean
[21:16] that the story I wanted to tell you is absolutely
[21:18] depressing and that there is no hope?
[21:21] This might be the final moral, I don't know.
[21:25] I am not sure of myself, on the moral of this history of energy.
[21:30] There is one aspect which seems important to me regardless.
[21:32] It is to remind how history was not written in advance.
[21:36] This history of energy addition that you have here, was not given in advance.
[21:41] To me, it was not obvious that it would be the technological fate of humanity, and we have many clues.
[21:49] I have the first argument, which is probably the most important,
[21:52] it is that there were other possible technological ways.
[21:56] There were technological alternatives.
[21:58] In particular, there is a long past of renewable energies.
[22:02] Historiens tend to tell a story
[22:05] of industrial revolution that has been made upon coal.
[22:07] And that is a very problematic history.
[22:09] More and more historians are realizing
[22:11] that far into the 19th century and even at the beginning of the 20th century,
[22:14] renewable energies are first. It is the main energy source.
[22:19] I am going to give some examples beginning by quite
[22:22] anecdotal things but that are interresting I think.
[22:25] We could telle that the second half of the 19th century,
[22:29] that we commonly call the Second Industrial Revolution,
[22:32] was partly founded upon the pedal.
[22:35] Muscular energy is put to the use of extraordinarily efficient
[22:40] and extremely innovative technological systems
[22:43] The first example is the sewing machine.
[22:45] The sewing machine, in particular Singer but this is not
[22:48] the only company, seems to be a real technological revolution
[22:53] during the second half of the 19th century.
[22:55] There are many social utopias around this sewing machine.
[22:58] It allows to decentralize production
[23:00] since we are, in the end, independant from energy circuits.
[23:03] It is a technologically advance machine.
[23:06] This is a innovative firm, Singer at the end of the 19th century
[23:10] and at the begining of the 20th century, it is more than 60 000 workers
[23:13] who fabricate sewing machines in 4 or 5 factories around the worlds.
[23:16] And this is a force of 300 000 sales representatives.
[23:20] So it is first the creation of a market.
[23:23] A marketing strengh really powerful,
[23:25] it is one of the biggest multinational companies at the end of the 19th century.
[23:29] And if I put you the Singer building that was build in 1906,
[23:33] if I reckon well.
[23:34] Anyway, in 1906 it is the tallest building in the world,
[23:37] the tallest office place of the world, I mean,
[23:39] the Eiffel Tower was taller,
[23:40] But in any case, in Manhattan, the tallest tower.
[23:44] It is to show you that at the end, on the pedal
[23:46] and muscular energy, big industrial empires
[23:49] are forming at the end of the 19th century.
[23:51] The other example is even better know it is obviously the bike.
[23:54] The bike at the end of the 19th century is a mean of transportation ultra generalized.
[23:58] In France, there are more than 10 milion bikes
[24:00] at the end of the 19th and at the beginning of the 20th century.
[24:03] The bike is a cutting-edge techology at the end of the 19th century.
[24:07] Ball-bearing for instance... This is something historian barely studied.
[24:11] What I am telling you about is, to tell the truth, in no precise book.
[24:14] There is nothing really precise about this, but we know for example
[24:17] that ball-bearing systems have most likely been invented
[24:19] by a French engineer, whose name was Suriray, in 1860.
[24:22] We know that this was a bicycle manufacturer that was totally unknown in Paris.
[24:25] And yet, ball-bearing, if you want, is crucial to many industrial processes
[24:30] which go from weaponry, electrical engines, etc.
[24:33] But all of this is created in link to bicycle.
[24:36] The manufacture d'armes of Saint-Étienne,
[24:38] which is obviously a weapon factory, will re-use many technologies
[24:42] coming from the army to improve ball-bearing,
[24:45] chains, etc. but at the end make a modern bicycle.
[24:49] These are really cutting-edge technologies. Ultra-vital technologies which employ
[24:53] hundreds of thousands workers in France.
[24:55] France is one of the top bike manufacturing powers.
[24:57] England and France are the two bike world powers at the end of the 19th century
[25:02] These are really cutting-edge technologies
[25:04] that rest upon muscular force.
[25:05] So i find this important because it breaks the natural teleology which would be to say, we go from muscular power,
[25:10] we think of our ancesters who slaved away like animals,
[25:14] to the marvelous world of fossil fuels.
[25:17] No, that is not at all the story.
[25:18] At the end of the 19th century there really was big systems and technologies that were based upon muscular force.
[25:23] Another example that may be even more noteworthy is water power.
[25:29] In the US, at the end of the 19th century,
[25:32] 75% of industrial energy sti... comes from water.
[25:36] I would be wrong to say "still" because it could have continued this way.
[25:38] There was a huge hydraulic potential
[25:41] that could have grown.
[25:43] Indeed, hydraulic energy at the end of the 19th century
[25:45] has nothing to do with mills in our technological imagination.
[25:51] These are tools which used the last knowledge of hydrodynamics.
[25:56] So an important point is that the sewing machine, the bike
[25:59] and hydraulics were all resting upon fossil fuels.
[26:02] Because to produce steel in these proportion,
[26:05] to produce bikes in an efficient way,
[26:08] which will then be made of aluminum, etc.
[26:10] we need fossil fuel and coal.
[26:13] That is a major point, it is not one or the other.
[26:15] There is a way to use fossils which is much
[26:17] smarter than burning gas to run cars in circles.
[26:21] That is the most important point.
[26:24] Hydraulics then, a Swedish historian, who worked on hydraulics
[26:32] and the steam machine in England, made a really interesting study.
[26:36] He is called Adreas Malm, he made an interesting study about
[26:38] the shift, well this is not really a shift, I am exagerating,
[26:41] but anyway of the growth of fossil fuels,
[26:45] so of the steam engine which activate weaving looms
[26:47] in Lancashire - around Manchester - in England.
[26:51] Curiously enough, the power drawn from steam
[26:58] costs much more, at constant kilojoules
[27:01] than water mills, than hydraulics in the 1830'.
[27:05] and yet, it is at this time that english manufacturers of textile,
[27:08] of cotton in particular, are thinking: we will use the steam engines.
[27:12] What he explains very well, is that there was a potential
[27:14] growth for hydraulics that was really huge.
[27:16] We could still build dams. We could still produce a lot a energy
[27:19] with mills in England in the 1830'.
[27:24] He also explains that mills necessitate a form
[27:30] of social coordination between entrepreneurs.
[27:34] Because it was necessary to invest together in dams.
[27:36] It was necessary to produce on the river sides, which led to a series of concerns.
[27:39] Because if you want to produce on the river sides, you need to be in the countryside. So you have to take the workers to the countryside,
[27:45] give them a stay, build schools,
[27:49] build industrial colonies. It means that if these workers get on strike, basically, you are stuck
[27:56] since you cannot replace them easily.
[27:58] now the 1830' are a time, in England, of really high social turmoil. It is the "Chartist" movement
[28:02] which ask for the extension of the Charter.
[28:05] That is to say universal suffrage.
[28:11] That makes that english industrials, in the end,
[28:16] what the want by using the steam engine, is not saving money, it is two things.
[28:21] Firstly, not having to coordinate with collegues
[28:24] which are also competitors, because if you use
[28:29] hydraulic energy, for instance, you have to agree on when do you open the sluice gates.
[28:32] If you need more energy
[28:34] will you have the right for more water to urn your mills?
[28:36] There are a lot of concerns which need common organisation.
[28:40] And what they want first is getting out of energy commons.
[28:42] Getting out of this use of energy which rests upon a common organisation,
[28:47] an agreement, a larger economic coordination.
[28:51] So that, they really want an individualistic solution to energy issues.
[28:54] And the steam engine is this, this allows to produce when we want,
[28:57] at the pace we want, according to the exchange rates, according to the demand, etc.
[28:59] It linearizes time. They are really the masters of the energy rhythm.
[29:05] Whereas when you produce with hydraulic force,
[29:07] you need to accomodate when there are droughts...
[29:09] Well this also put the issues about time controling
[29:13] which are extremely important for the English economic world of 1830.
[29:17] The second vital function of the steam engine,
[29:21] is that it allows to produce anywhere, but in particular
[29:23] to produce in town where there are vast human agglomerations
[29:27] and a mass proletariat thar we can pay less.
[29:31] And if finally your workers get on strike,
[29:33] It is not a problem you can find other people to replace them
[29:36] more easily that if you had to bring them to the countryside.
[29:38] So the point is important, because it means that the use of steam
[29:41] in 1830 does not obey to any technologocal or economic rationality.
[29:45] It is more expensive and extremely polluting because the 1830' have terrible yields.
[29:49] We are going to talk in more detail about it
[29:51] It is dangerous because steam engines furthermore have a tendancy to blow up regularly.
[29:55] Steam furnaces are still lousy in these years.
[29:58] There is a huge risk of explosion.
[30:01] In spite of everything, English industrials are taking the leap in the 1830'.
[30:06] Because they are part of a certain economic and ideological framework
[30:10] which is, in the end, the free market, competition, productivism as well.
[30:15] Knowing that the English industrial and economic growth in these years
[30:21] rests strongly upon textile exports.
[30:23] England has a really special asset.
[30:25] It is that it exports a lot of textile products in this period, compared to other countries.
[30:30] It is also linked to a form of globalization.
[30:32] So this, this is an example I find interresting
[30:33] because it shows that energy choices
[30:36] do not necessarily meet a form of rationality.
[30:38] We inherited many choices which are rather irrationnal.
[30:41] Which will allow me to discuss other aspects.
[30:44] Wind power, another form of energy, that we can think as old fashioned
[30:49] in the 19th century, but not at all.
[30:52] Wind, particularly in the US, at the end of the 19th century, is considerable.
[30:58] In he 1890', this is more than 6 million wind turbines
[31:01] that are industrially produced with the best knowledge
[31:04] of air dynamics, by a few firms in the US.
[31:11] And these are 6 million wind turbines that, in the Midwest,
[31:13] allow the cultivation of these vast plains
[31:15] which will become one of the centers of cereal production in the world.
[31:20] So one of the biggest transformation of the farming industry
[31:25] at the end of the 19th century is based on wind power.
[31:30] And the last example I wanted to give you.
[31:33] it the the example of solar power.
[31:38] So, in the history of solar power...
[31:42] An important moment is doubtlessly in the US between the 1930' and the 1950'
[31:46] I will explain why.
[31:48] In the 1930', some architechts
[31:50] of whom George Fred Keck are deeply studying
[31:53] studying the technologies of the passive house.
[31:57] Basically, it is at this moment that a company
[32:00] called Thermopane is patenting double glazing.
[32:03] And so are defined the principles of a passive house, really energy efficient.
[32:07] At the beginning it is rather an elitist technology.
[32:10] It is adressing rich Americans
[32:12] who want to get out of urban networks, of electricity, etc.
[32:16] to go build pretty houses in the countryside.
[32:18] But, interresting fact, is that during the second world war,
[32:22] because the US government want to save up on oil
[32:25] and send it at maximum to the front,
[32:27] there are big investments which are done in the development
[32:30] of the solar house, in particular at the MIT.
[32:32] Where they are developping a solar house with a physicist
[32:35] called Maria Telkes.
[32:37] At the end of World War 2, the solar house
[32:39] seems edge cutting.
[32:41] It is something that we need to make real.
[32:42] There is a whole discourse about: we are going to make solar houses in the US.
[32:45] Because the end of World War 2 for the US,
[32:49] It is a big moment of malthusian worrying on resources.
[32:52] It is a bit like the Club of Rome report in the 1970'
[32:55] twenty years before, american are thinking:
[32:57] we sacrificed our resources on the altar of freedom.
[33:01] We consumed a lot of oil, minerals, etc.
[33:03] to produce a war industry and to free Western Europe
[33:07] and by so doing we do not have anymore ressources.
[33:08] Which is false indeed, Americans still have
[33:10] tons of minerals and even oil and coal.
[33:12] Anyway there is this discourse which is really strong in the public sphere.
[33:16] Truman is setting the "Fairdeal" comission which studies
[33:20] the oil spike and these issues
[33:21] about the lack of resources in the 1950'. So the solar house is part of this
[33:26] instant: the malthusian worrying. There are many physicists
[33:30] of the Manhattan project who say: let's leave nuclear power
[33:33] because it is too complicated, very dangerous,
[33:36] that might be expensive, we don't have that much
[33:38] uranium, etc. And they say that future is all about
[33:40] solar power and the solar house.
[33:42] And despite all that, the solar house is going to decline.
[33:47] Even though there was a booming market.
[33:49] In the 1950' it is 80% of houses, in Florida, in California,
[33:54] evidently the States the more exposed to sunlight, which use solar water heaters.
[33:57] It is not necessarily ultra-high-tech stuff.
[33:59] There was the MIT house which was very high-tech.
[34:01] But the majority of solar technologies are basic ones.
[34:03] These are pipes painted black which run on a well exposed roof.
[34:07] It allows to have hot water to shower oneselves
[34:09] These are not complicated things.
[34:12] And what is interresting to see is that this whole sector,
[34:15] at least this technological trajectory which was extremely promising
[34:17] is finally going to collapse.
[34:20] In the 1950'... It is partly... Obviously it would be a bit ridiculous
[34:26] to say it is only this man's fault. But this is a man
[34:28] called William Levitt who is an american real estate developer
[34:34] who in the 50' explains that he has the means to solve
[34:38] the housing crisis which was nagging in the US.
[34:40] One should know that in the 50', obviously, it is a time
[34:42] of huge economic growth in Western Europe and in the US:
[34:45] the GI are coming back and then demographic boom.
[34:49] So there was a house shortage, and this dear Mr Levitt explains
[34:53] that what we should do, is applying the good old taylorian
[34:55] methods of rationalization of manufacturing into the housing sector.
[34:58] Finally, he thinks
[34:59] that this is absurd to see that we did so great at building
[35:02] cars in mass, and that we can do the same
[35:04] for housing: it is to say, simplify tasks.
[35:06] The problem is that in order to proceed, we should also simplify
[35:08] the building very deeply and make rabbit hutches very badly insulated.
[35:14] The result, is that every architectural effort
[35:19] to make energy-efficient houses are abandoned.
[35:23] And we produce houses that are impossible to live in during summer
[35:26] because ill-insulated, lousy.
[35:28] So as soon as the 50', we put air conditionners en masse
[35:33] in these American house estates.
[35:37] The problem is that once you have air conditionners,
[35:39] it creates an energy demand spike during summer.
[35:43] Eletricians hate that because it compels them to oversize
[35:46] production capacities to meet the spike and in the end,
[35:48] there is a lot of capital unused outside of these spike periods.
[35:53] So electricians, which are General Electric
[35:55] and Insull mainly, are going to plead for electric heating.
[36:00] So, Electric heating,
[36:02] in a country such as the US, well gifted with gas, oil,
[36:05] coal and wood aswell, it really is an aberration.
[36:07] Because you know, it is a really poor energy yield.
[36:11] You turn heat energy into electricity,
[36:13] that you then turn back into heat energy with losses all along the line.
[36:16] So it is really a bad energy choice.
[36:18] This is a really interresting example.
[36:19] We can see that there was, seemingly, another possible trajectory
[36:23] toward more energy efficient housing,
[36:25] even solar, even autonomous.
[36:28] And because of the interrest of some real estate developers,
[36:32] combined with the individual interests of electricians,
[36:36] we come to this aberration, which is the fully-electric
[36:39] suburb house of the US in the 50' and 60',
[36:41] extraordinarily energy-consuming with a whole rethoric
[36:44] adding to the energy consumption.
[36:46] Americans in those years, if they only had the air conditoner
[36:51] they had the right to stick a little bronze insigna onto their house.
[36:54] If they had the air conditioner and heater, this was a silver insigna
[36:57] and if the whole house was fully electric, and often by the way suburb
[37:00] house, at this time,
[37:02] electricians were realizing that it was when they
[37:05] bought the house, that they absolutely needed to equip everything
[37:08] electric, the oven, the fridge, etc. Then you got the gold insigna.
[37:12] So, there was a really strong propaganda
[37:14] for energy consumption. There were some slides of
[37:19] these houses build en masse in these 50' - 60'.
[37:24] One last example which seems really important to me, is the case of the car.
[37:30] The individual car is, whitout a doubt, the technological choice
[37:34] which really created this shift toward fossile
[37:38] relying economies, toward the anthropocene
[37:41] to use the now established term.
[37:43] This is an etremely energy-consuming technology,
[37:45] very harmful in regards to the environment.
[37:47] That mostly began in the US, there really is
[37:50] an american distinctive characteristic of choosing the car.
[37:53] From the end of the 20', it is not far from half of american households
[37:56] who are equiped with cars, this famous Ford T,
[37:59] while in Western Europe, even in the rich coutries
[38:02] sush as England, it is not at all the case.
[38:04] We are far from this penetration rate.
[38:06] We need to wait the 60' to have equivalent penetration rates.
[38:09] And a weird thing is that the car
[38:12] which was often assimilated to a love of freedom,
[38:15] there really would be a kind of attraction for cars,
[38:19] an individualist solution that allows to move fast etc.
[38:23] Actually, when we look the beginning of cars
[38:25] there was no natural evidence.
[38:29] And no evidence that the car would grow
[38:31] so fast in the US, for several reasons.
[38:35] First, the car at the begining is a nuisance
[38:40] for a large majority of the population
[38:43] and a luxury for a few rich people.
[38:48] And this pose a bunch of problems in terms of:
[38:51] who belongs the road and the street in town,
[38:55] there are many complaints, resistances, petitions
[38:58] against the individual car because we feel that
[39:02] it really is an appropriation by the snoby rich of the urban area.
[39:05] For example, children plays aren't possible anymore
[39:07] in the street due to cars.
[39:09] In the 1900', if you consider the big american cities,
[39:12] it is a carnage, hundreds
[39:13] of children are being crush over every year.
[39:15] In the 1920', there is an entire movement
[39:18] against car violence that sets in place
[39:21] with huge protests.
[39:22] More than 10 000 children demonstrate in New York in 1922.
[39:26] Monuments are erected to the dead
[39:28] children crushed under the car wheels.
[39:30] There is a strong fight against cars.
[39:34] In France, it is the same, we don't have precise studies
[39:36] but a journalist called Pierre Thiesset
[39:38] made a good job at compiling every article
[39:41] against the car in France in those years.
[39:46] Most of the newspapers find unthinkable
[39:51] the idea to give the streets to cars.
[39:57] I remember an article from The Economist in 1911
[39:59] that explains we cannot tolerate something that smells so bad,
[40:01] that makes so much dust in London streets, it is unbearable.
[40:04] Yet The Economist isn't a technophobic newspaper, against development or anything.
[40:09] So, we don't have surveys about cars but we got Switzerland
[40:12] And Switzerland is very interresting because
[40:15] they have a tradition of popular initiatives.
[40:20] and the canton of the Grisons
[40:21] which is a german speaking canton in the east, in the 1900',
[40:27] forbids car usage. They say: it ruins roads,
[40:33] so costs a lot to repair and to
[40:35] maintain, it pollutes, it is dangerous,
[40:39] and it is undue competion towards the railroad.
[40:45] In Switzerland, the railroad is property of the State.
[40:47] So, we will need to raise more money for the pleasure
[40:50] of a few Swiss rich in terms of repairing the roads
[40:54] and subsides to the railroad company.
[40:59] Ten times, the Swiss auto-club lobby group
[41:05] will try to bring down this law
[41:07] through popular initiatives,
[41:08] and will get kicked everytime.
[41:11] So between 1900 and 1928, ten times, the Swiss said:
[41:14] we don't want to allow individual car traffic on the canton roads.
[41:20] So, this isn't a technophobic argument
[41:21] because, again, these are essentially economic argument and there is also the pollution.
[41:25] But for instance they allow trucks of course.
[41:27] Because trucks have a manifest utility to carry heavy loads.
[41:30] This is more efficient that what we had before.
[41:33] They allow ambulances, fire trucks...
[41:35] It is the idea that we can choose the use of technologies.
[41:39] But, deeply I think that the example of Switzerland
[41:41] shows well enough that if we had been living in a truely
[41:44] democratic society, where democracy had been extanded to technological choices,
[41:48] it is not clear that the car would have got the story we know.
[41:52] Furthermore, to take back the case of the US,
[41:56] in the US, roads were not good quality roads,
[42:00] ill-kept, otfen not or not much tarmacked.
[42:04] and in the US, there was an extanded network
[42:06] of tramway: the electric tramway.
[42:09] In the US in 1900, there are 35 000km of electric tramway lines.
[42:14] It represents 5 billion travels a year for 100 million inhabitants,
[42:18] to give the size of tramway usage.
[42:22] So, it was a technology not totally green
[42:25] because it was electricity made with coal
[42:27] but anyway much greener that individual cars.
[42:31] What is interresting is seeing that
[42:33] the car replaced the tramway because, here we can talk
[42:36] of a transition.To find cars in the US today, you better get up early.
[42:39] There are still some in a few cities but it is rare.
[42:41] There are some in San Fransisco, Portland, but globally
[42:44] there aren't many tramways in the US.
[42:46] The story of the tragedy, because we can see this
[42:50] as a tragedy, happens in several instalments.
[42:54] First, the car is linked to the development
[42:57] of suburbia, basically.
[43:00] and the suburbs are perceived, in the conservative elite minds
[43:04] of the time, in the 1920' Herbert Hoover
[43:07] is the US president,
[43:08] as the best way to fight communism.
[43:12] The goal is to turn Americans
[43:15] into individual house owners.
[43:17] Because, Herbert Hoover says:
[43:19] when we have our own house,
[43:21] we have other political affects than when we live
[43:24] in ethnically and socially diverse cities.
[43:27] So there is an encouragement toward suburbanisation
[43:30] which is linked to a much broader political project
[43:35] which is to block socialism and communism in the US.
[43:41] and the car fits in this context.
[43:44] Because the car is developping a lot, especially with Ford.
[43:50] At this time, this booming of cars in the US,
[43:55] takes place because of consumer credit.
[43:59] before the car, the consumer credit wasn't really a thing.
[44:03] Or it was really informal
[44:06] in let's say, dubious places.
[44:09] Those who could afford it were the rich
[44:12] to buy a house of business men to buy appliances.
[44:16] but globally, you could not borrow in order to consume.
[44:19] And the big car companies,
[44:21] Ford and General Motors, are going to become big credit suppliers
[44:26] and the stake is to set in place a form of social control. Because once you have bought
[44:33] your car on credit, and that you have weekly
[44:36] loan payments, you need to earn a sum of money each month,
[44:41] each week with your job.
[44:43] And doing this, the american companies
[44:47] succeeded to solve a fundamental problem they had
[44:51] which was factory turnover.
[44:55] Before the Great Crash of 1929, a period full of employment,
[44:58] american workers were in a strong position.
[45:02] Particularly workers of the car industry.
[45:05] They had high wages and labour historian showed well that in the world of
[45:12] qualified workers a culture of the sufficient. These high wages,
[45:15] in opposition to the neoclassical economic theory,
[45:18] didn't spur workers to work more and earn more.
[45:21] It spurred to work less, because ouce you had enough money to pay for your needs
[45:25] and those of your family, you stopped working.
[45:28] That means that higly paid workers had an unfortunate tendency
[45:31] to absenteism, to not come to work on moday morning, etc.
[45:36] Or changing job when the employer or the foreman was a bit annoying.
[45:40] And to Ford, it was a real issue.
[45:42] You know, Ford introduced the conveyor belt production techniques
[45:45] and he had a hard time finding workers to fullfil the job,
[45:48] because it was a mind numbing work.
[45:51] There was a figure where, roughly, he needed to find
[45:53] nine workers to get a single one long term.
[45:57] There wasa really big turnover problem.
[45:59] So, if you want, cars,
[46:02] The setting up of consumer credits tightly
[46:04] linked to the car, it is a wonderful mean
[46:06] of social control through consumerism.
[46:13] The other moment of truce
[46:16] which makes us leave this public transportation system...
[46:19] It is less crucial,
[46:21] but it is an interresting law because
[46:22] it is an antitrust law. We could think these kind of law are good. Think about Google, Amazon, Facebook
[46:27] and co, the well-known GAFA. We should break the trusts,
[46:30] but here it had a desastrous
[46:31] consequence because in 1935, there was a law
[46:35] titled the Wheeeler Rayburn Act which dismantles
[46:38] the big electric trusts. So General Electric and Insull
[46:41] have to sell their tramway company.
[46:43] And, tramway companies may as well make sense
[46:45] in a vast indutrial conglomerate, to smooth
[46:48] the power demand spikes i told you about.
[46:51] But, taken individually, each of these tramway
[46:52] companies was at a deficit.
[46:54] Which means that they will be bought up for nothing
[46:57] by General Motors, Firestone and Standard Oil.
[47:01] And you can guess, by Sloan,
[47:03] Who is CEO for General Motors and is also
[47:06] the shadow man of this story.
[47:09] You can imagine that for these companies,
[47:11] for tire, car, and oil industries.
[47:14] The heart of their business model
[47:16] was not to create collective electric transportation
[47:19] and they will work on sabotaging the tramway system
[47:22] and replace it with fuel buses, to not maintening the lines
[47:25] or simply to close them
[47:27] to increase their car market.
[47:31] So I think it is an interesting example
[47:33] because it is paralel to the case
[47:36] of the solar house and the transition to an all-electric system.
[47:40] We see well that technological world we get
[47:42] today, is not a world that respond to a form of optimization.
[47:45] Because i sincerely think that the car
[47:47] was not at all the optimal choice.
[47:49] Texts from the 1910', making think about Ivan Illitch
[47:52] or André Gorz before their time, said that the individual car
[47:55] is going to slow down, in the end, motion.
[47:57] We will arrive in a sub-optimal situation because
[48:00] congestions are an obvious problem, right away.
[48:03] And because it is a big CO2 emitter, very energy demanding.
[48:09] Which is build because of real interests,
[48:13] Those are not general interrests
[48:15] but industrial and economical ones, that are very particular.
[48:19] – Just maybe...Would that mean...
[48:22] I don't know – if you have question don't hesitate.
[48:24] But does this mean that these transition period...
[48:28] of not transition but addition of energies
[48:30] are also moments of socio-economical struggle, for profound friction
[48:35] and that we forget this fact too often in this story?
[48:40] - Yes, that is a very important point.
[48:42] Si you take the big technologies of the anthropocene,
[48:46] the ones that emitt a lot of CO2,
[48:47] that consume the most energy
[48:49] because they deeply transform the environment
[48:51] and the ways of life, they are not made
[48:53] in a form of growth or rather of belief for progress.
[48:59] This is not at all how it happened.
[49:01] We could imagine hat the 19th century was simply progressist
[49:03] and that at the 20th, we were still fascinated by machines
[49:06] and that this is only recently that we worry about the environment
[49:09] and that we question the technological trajectory.
[49:11] This is a entirely wrong vision.
[49:13] I already told you about cars, big scandal and for all that,
[49:17] that happened, with takeovers, lobbying...
[49:22] Well there is a fascinating book by Norton who tells
[49:25] how the car conquered the road in the US.
[49:27] It was really violent.
[49:29] We are going to learn to the pedestrians how to cross the street,
[49:32] we will explain that the road does not belong to them
[49:34] that it belongs to the car first.
[49:35] We will punish, for example jaywalking,
[49:37] to wross the road where you should not, etc.
[49:39] We will teach the kids to respect the red lights, etc.
[49:42] You can imagine the whole setting of this discipline
[49:45] so that cars car run peacefully in town.
[49:48] This, indeed, is done despite the complaints, the struggles.
[49:51] The fun fact is that shopkeepers are totally
[49:53] against the car at the beginning. Whereas now,
[49:54] as soon as we put a car-free street, shopkeepers complaint
[49:57] but at the beginning of the 20th century it was the contrary.
[50:01] We close a quay to traffic and it is a undescribable tragedy.
[50:04] You don't imagine... prevent the entire city to pedestrians.
[50:08] It is quite what the car meant in the 1920'.
[50:11] So these are ultra-important moments of struggle
[50:16] And an example that seems fundamentally important to me,
[50:18] and that we need to keep in mind,
[50:19] is an quite recent historical asset and not well-known.
[50:23] It is that environment is ultra-important at the end of the 18th
[50:29] and start of the 19th century, when the industrial revolution happens.
[50:31] Environment, at this time, is first a medical concept.
[50:36] Environment is the best concept that physicians have to
[50:40] understand epidemics.
[50:41] How is that everybody is going to get ill
[50:42] at the same time in this room?
[50:44] This is not because somebody will have given us a microbe,
[50:46] that we would have give one another.
[50:47] No, it is because something has changed in the environment.
[50:50] In the air quality, in the water quality,
[50:51] in what physicians call the surroundings.
[50:54] They were using a latin term: "circumfusa",
[50:56] all things that surround us
[50:57] and that determine our health. And even further,
[51:00] a population's health, its number,
[51:02] and even the shapes of the bodies.
[51:04] Because we are still in a transformist way of thinking.
[51:10] Think Jean-Baptiste de Lamarck who explains that we transmit the
[51:12] characters we aquire to our posterity, so,
[51:15] there is this idea that environment deeply transforms bodies,
[51:18] and that we transmit these transformations to our posterity.
[51:21] An environment alteration
[51:24] really has tragic consequences
[51:26] in the minds of 18th century people.
[51:29] Two examples. In 1732, there is a man
[51:32] called George Cheyne, an English doctor
[51:34] who writes a book intitled "The English malady".
[51:37] This this English malady is coal.
[51:39] He explains that every constinuant, every caracteristics
[51:43] of British health are altered kilometers around
[51:47] London. Because in London, we burn
[51:49] a lot of coal to warm up and that produces
[51:52] a health disaster. Another striking example,
[51:55] is a Rouennais physician, who criticize
[51:59] Paris police, saying...
[52:03] I should first explain that what we call police,
[52:06] at the end of the 18th century, has little to do
[52:11] with police nowadays.
[52:13] The police at the end of the 18th century, is an urban institution.
[52:15] It deals with anything linked with
[52:18] the city, in particular the environment.
[52:21] And in police treaties of the end of the 18th century,
[52:23] we find a lot of references to the population health,
[52:26] to air quality inspired by a greek physician
[52:29] called Hippocrate, who studied the link
[52:34] between environment and health.
[52:36] The Rouennais physician explains that the Paris police
[52:39] had not done a good job,
[52:40] and Paris has become the most ill, the most twisted,
[52:43] the most hunchbacked and ugly people on Earth
[52:45] because the Paris police poorly handled the environment
[52:48] and by so doing produced this degeneration
[52:50] of the population. So environment
[52:51] is ultra-important. Anyway, the coal and chemical
[52:56] industries developped. We mass produced, with extremely
[53:00] polluting methods,
[53:02] despite this strong environmental consciousness and worry.
[53:07] This provoked a lot of struggles.
[53:09] I worked a lot on chemical plants at the beginning of the 19th century.
[53:14] For each plant, you have hundreds of petitions,
[53:17] often signed by doctors who explain,
[53:20] that if you, prefect,
[53:22] allow this plant, you are going to produce degenaration
[53:24] in this borough's population. And that is really something
[53:27] massive. It is a crucial point...
[53:30] This is not some sort of consciousness reserved to the elite.
[53:32] No, this is an general thing.
[53:35] This is crucial because we tend to think about
[53:37] the resistances against technologies as something
[53:41] elitist and rather
[53:42] marginal. It would be in the romantic circles
[53:44] of the 19th century, the anarchists circles that
[53:46] we would have think that we should
[53:49] break machines, etc. No, because this shift toward
[53:52] fossil fuels had already been subject to protean
[53:56] resistances and the bourgeoisie was very
[53:59] divided on the matter.
[54:02] Because there was, on the one hand, the industrial bourgoisie
[54:04] who wanted to produce more efficiently,
[54:06] sometime using fossil fuels
[54:08] or by producing disgusting chemical reactions.
[54:11] And then, there was the urban up-middle class, who owned buildings
[54:15] in big cities such as Paris,
[54:17] who had absolutely no desire to have a stinking factory
[54:20] just next to it.
[54:21] So, necessarily, that creates a lot of struggles.
[54:24] This is an important point.
[54:26] - I am often the devil's advocate but we only
[54:29] have left ten minutes or so, maybe we could slide
[54:33] toward the questions about transition that bring us back to today.
[54:39] About what represents the energy transition today?
[54:42] What about these questions of technological transition, of Green Techs?
[54:47] What does it implies and what does...
[54:50] - Indeed, this is the moment when the historian
[54:52] is the least competent.
[54:53] But what I am trying to show you is that
[54:56] doing a real energy transition is not all about
[55:00] putting some wind mills or solar panels
[55:02] to answer a constant demand in energy.
[55:06] That these energy needs, this technological world
[55:10] that we heritate from, really needs to be
[55:14] called into question.
[55:16] It finally means doing an inventory about
[55:17] a series of choices that have been made in the past.
[55:20] If i can, a last historical trip: the military
[55:24] is ultra-important in this case, in the history
[55:26] of energy.
[55:28] Why? Because the military, when the issue is to kill
[55:32] and not be killed, energy efficiency is not
[55:34] what matters the most.
[55:37] If you take a F-16, a Mirage or a Rafale,
[55:41] It consumes between 6000 and 8000 L of kerosene an hour.
[55:45] So it means as much as
[55:47] several years of a standard car.
[55:50] We are in some sorts of energetic exuberance
[55:52] which are proper to the military.
[55:54] The problem is that army, given that it is
[55:58] at the cutting-edge of technological systems, then
[56:00] these military technologies spread to civil technologies.
[56:04] This is a classic, but I will simply give you
[56:06] two examples: first, the aviation.
[56:10] We cannot think about aviation as we know it today without
[56:13] the Second World War.
[56:15] It is during World War II that all the infrastructures that allow contemporary
[56:17] aviation to set in place.
[56:20] Aluminum, that we start to mass produce
[56:22] on the American continent, is linked
[56:24] to World War II. The production
[56:26] of plane fuel, which is a really specific thing
[56:28] are considerable reseach projects
[56:30] of the same order as the Manhattan Project,
[56:33] for the atomic bomb during World War II.
[56:35] So aviation, really, is the daughter of World War II.
[56:39] Up to the point in 1944 when the US,
[56:42] who know well that they are in advance
[56:43] on all these technologies, are setting this system,
[56:47] a treaty in Chicago, who installs
[56:49] the International Civil Aviation Organization
[56:51] which prevent taxation of these fuels.
[56:53] And nowadays, we still live with this regime.
[56:56] So, starting to talk about energy transition, is starting to talk about this.
[56:59] Seriously talking about aviation as we know it.
[57:02] Aviation as we know it is not compatible with climate goals.
[57:05] It is a sector that increase really much in terms of CO2 emissions.
[57:08] I believe it double every ten years, at least, it goes really fast.
[57:11] And this is something we can't really replace,
[57:14] we cannot make planes fly with
[57:15] electricity, with the actual technologies.
[57:17] The second example I find interresting are the highways.
[57:21] The Highways, indeed, have a certain role
[57:25] in the waste of energy.
[57:28] It is first a military technology.
[57:30] The first to build highways are Italiens and Germans
[57:33] before World War II.
[57:35] For nazi Germany, the goal is to solve
[57:37] the strategic dilema of being vulnerable
[57:39] to a coordonate attack on both fronts, the East front and the West front.
[57:42] Building highways had to allow the Wehrmacht
[57:45] to go across really fast, to invade Poland and then
[57:47] coming back fast to avoid being invaded by the French and the English.
[57:50] It had a highly strategical function.
[57:53] Eisenhower, who was the chief of allied forces, came back marveled
[57:58] from Germany by these highways, which are clearly
[58:01] better than US roads.
[58:04] And under his mandate, is voted what is one of the biggest civil ingeneering
[58:09] projects of the 20th century: the Interstate Highways Defense Act.
[58:15] So the link between highways and the military, are that the highways
[58:18] had to allow the decentralization of the whole american industrial production.
[58:24] The goal was to make the economy resilient
[58:26] against a Russian nuclear warfare.
[58:28] Roughly, the Americans had realized that the Germans
[58:30] had really succeeded to continue to purvey their factory of
[58:33] ball-bearing, of sulfur acid,
[58:35] anything needed to sustain a war economy.
[58:40] German tanks were working, were repaired, etc.
[58:42] despite the massive and constant bombing of the RAF and of the US Air Force.
[58:47] And how did they manage to do this, is because they
[58:49] had scattered the industry across the whole german country.
[58:51] The goal of the highways is to do the same thing
[58:53] at the level of an entire continent, the United States.
[58:56] And so, if we want to talk about energy transition,
[58:58] we need to talk about the form of cities.
[59:02] One example, these days we talk about electric cars,
[59:06] and even worse, of self-driving electric cars
[59:09] So, an electric car, if you take the Tesla
[59:12] The weight of the battery is of 540kg, now, the Tesla
[59:16] is particularly monstruous, because it is a very powerful car, etc. Anyway it weighs a lot and so,
[59:20] honestly, the best solution already,
[59:21] is to make very light cars, which don't go so fast,
[59:24] I would say, 70 or 80 km per hour maximum,
[59:27] They should be lightened a lot, share a carpool...
[59:29] There are a thousand other smart solutions before doing electric cars,
[59:33] which are very demanding in rare metals,
[59:36] rare earth metal is not about rarity, it is mostly about that their extraction pollutes a lot.
[59:39] So there is an argument, which would be:
[59:41] transition is impossible because we don't have the ressources...
[59:45] We have no idea, given the size of Earth's mantle
[59:47] I feel that it is not going to be an issue, but rather...
[59:48] Where will we accept to produce these rare earth metals which are gross to produce?
[59:52] For now, it is going to be in Baotou, a chinese city,
[59:55] particularly, where they extract a lot of these metals.
[59:58] Any green tech
[01:00:00] relying on many materials are an issue.
[01:00:04] Typically, the wrong kind of answer
[01:00:07] we bring up front. The electric car is
[01:00:11] the best example, the worst, indeed, being the self-driving cars.
[01:00:13] Autonomous cars will produce a big
[01:00:18] rebound effect.
[01:00:20] There is a recent article in Science which showed,
[01:00:22] that is a simple thing, they suggested simply
[01:00:26] a free driver given to several segments of the population.
[01:00:29] At the moment you have a free driver who can
[01:00:31] drive you anywhere by day or night, the kilometers skyrocket.
[01:00:35] Because you say: here, I am going to the restaurant
[01:00:36] at full night but no problem, I am carried.
[01:00:38] And for instance, the older people do many more kilometers
[01:00:41] starting at the moment they don't have to drive anymore.
[01:00:44] So, indeed, the autonomous car is going to be a source
[01:00:46] of kilometric growth absolutely gigantic,
[01:00:52] As well as the electric car probably.
[01:00:54] Here, in my opinion, if we want to reason
[01:00:56] in serious terms on this issue about energy transition,
[01:01:00] We need to stop talking in terms of primary energy production.
[01:01:03] Because here, we can't get out, if our energy consumtion
[01:01:06] is constant, the mass of rare earth in order to produce
[01:01:11] wind mills and solar panels is absolutely nonsensical.
[01:01:14] I don't know if it is achieveable, but anyway it is surely
[01:01:16] really polluting.
[01:01:18] And do we want to put ourselves in a chain of very strong
[01:01:21] dependancy toward China who is
[01:01:23] for now the only massive producer of rare earth.
[01:01:27] There is a really good book by Guillaume Pitron,
[01:01:29] who is not particularly environment friendly,
[01:01:31] but he explains that there is a national sovereignty problem.
[01:01:33] China, while it accepts doing the most disgusting stuff on its land,
[01:01:37] this production of rare earth conquers bit by bit the chain of value.
[01:01:40] I mean, finally, gets the most of added value
[01:01:43] by producing magnets, batteries, etc.
[01:01:45] And the European industrials who whould be strong, for instance,
[01:01:48] to create high-end oil engines etc.
[01:01:51] are bad at building electrical engines.
[01:01:53] They are going to be reduced at being sheet metal benders.
[01:01:55] So, in fact, we are going to enter a form
[01:01:57] of technological degrowth in some countries.
[01:02:00] Which is also a problem, outside of any environmental issue.
[01:02:02] It economical terms, it is a real problem, for jobs, etc.
[01:02:05] It is not obvious at all that the energy transition will be purveyor of jobs
[01:02:09] It is a kind of myth as well, environment friendly,
[01:02:12] to say that we are going to report in the end...
[01:02:15] That we are going to produce less energy with
[01:02:17] machines and put people to work and by so doing creating jobs.
[01:02:19] But to me this is an illusion as well.
[01:02:22] The productivity of a machine is such that is you reduce the number of machine
[01:02:27] or the suppplying in machines, in fact you reduce to jobs.
[01:02:29] Because in fact, humans are not competitive compared to machines.
[01:02:33] So there, there are many fundamental problems, to my mind, that...
[01:02:36] That we need to confront if we want to start talking seriously
[01:02:40] of energy transition.
[01:02:42] - So, maybe some questions, if you want?
[01:02:47] - Yes i would like to thank you for your exposé which was passionating.
[01:02:50] I wanted to go back to the begining, because I'm a little disturbed.
[01:02:53] Because there is one other...There is one specialist
[01:02:55] of energy called Jean-Marc Jancovici
[01:02:58] and who talks about energy spikes, either oil, or gas, all that,
[01:03:02] and who explains that, indeed, there is oil
[01:03:04] and all that but that it would seem that one century ago
[01:03:07] we used 10 oil barrels to get 100.
[01:03:10] Today we need 10 barrels to get 20 or 30
[01:03:14] and that if this ratio gets to 10 for 15, it stops.
[01:03:17] So even if oil is here, we won't have energy anymore to get it...
[01:03:21] What is your position toward this?
[01:03:22] - I think that as long as it will be profitable to get it, we will, even if the costs are huge.
[01:03:26] I mean, schist oil or gas, energetically it is not terrific.
[01:03:30] Now, there was a recent article in Le Monde,
[01:03:32] where we saw that in Texas, it shot up.
[01:03:33] Simply because there was money to make.
[01:03:34] So we will go on to extract schist oil and gas,
[01:03:37] Even if it costs more and more energy wise.
[01:03:39] As long as it is financially profitable, we will do it.
[01:03:41] Even if in terms of energetician it does not make any sense,
[01:03:44] or that it does less and less sense, I think that the economic world
[01:03:47] does not work like this.
[01:03:48] The issue is in reality that, this oil spike issue,
[01:03:51] well, I already said it, but we've been talking about it for a long time.
[01:03:53] and every time we realize that there is still junk to burn.
[01:03:55] For example, there was articles about methan hydrates
[01:03:58] that are found in the ocean, these are tons and tons
[01:04:00] of coal we could still burn.
[01:04:02] I don't know, I am not an geologist expert of these questions.
[01:04:05] But I feel that focusing on the spike, we might forget
[01:04:09] about the first wall which is climate. Furthermore, this issue of the spike
[01:04:14] and of the collapse linked to the spike passage,
[01:04:15] is even so a riches' ecology.
[01:04:17] Because it is us, the rich countries, who are confronted
[01:04:19] to this energy scarcity issue.
[01:04:21] The least developped countries do not consume much energy.
[01:04:24] So, at a push, it is not really their concern.
[01:04:26] Though, the thing that is really unfair with climate change,
[01:04:29] is that this is the rich countries that took advantage of it,
[01:04:30] emitting CO2, and the tropical countries,
[01:04:33] rather poor, will be affected very strongly
[01:04:36] by the question of climate change.
[01:04:39] So, focusing a bit too much on the spike issue,
[01:04:42] we might get lost in the weeds, that is to say
[01:04:44] of global warming, which is the first and most urgent thing to solve.
[01:04:46] - We often hear about..., precisely of owners of...
[01:04:51] who develop carbon energies. Who buy a lot of patents
[01:04:54] to burry them and go on exploiting carbon energies.
[01:05:01] - I am not sure I get it here.
[01:05:03] - Patents which would not use carbon energies,
[01:05:05] - Patent that were bought in order to...
[01:05:08] - To stop technologies by buying the patent.
[01:05:12] - I have not seen that in what I have read but why not, I don't know.
[01:05:14] - Ok, by the way, the Japanese made a car
[01:05:18] with magnets, each wheel, is a bunch of magnets
[01:05:21] and each magnet has a lifespan of 250 years.
[01:05:25] And they make a Mitsubishi car run with magnets.
[01:05:28] - Well, I don't know at all this car. I never heard of...
[01:05:30] - I thikn it is more about politics and industrials
[01:05:32] that slow everything down.
[01:05:34] - I think that the question of the car, is its past, in fact.
[01:05:37] First off, it is really... you can get a car to run with anything
[01:05:39] you want but it has an absurd premise to move one ton of metal
[01:05:43] to move 80kg of flesh. So, I think fundamentally,
[01:05:47] the car, the problem is that we focus, there,
[01:05:49] on the new cars, the last gimmick that will allow to
[01:05:52] make a super car. And we don't talk anymore about collective
[01:05:53] transports, subway, bus, bike, Low Tech things that work well...
[01:05:58] - One does not prevent the other.
[01:06:00] - Or does it... This is
[01:06:01] an important point, we cannot develop everything.
[01:06:03] we cannot have everything, I think there is a time
[01:06:05] when rightfully, both economically and
[01:06:07] environmentally speaking, we cannot develop everything.
[01:06:11] And to live in innovative societies, that is a really important point,
[01:06:13] to me, what does it mean, I think we live in a very
[01:06:15] innovative society. It does not mean that we have
[01:06:16] to be technophobic, but that we need to choose.
[01:06:18] We need to chose certain technological pathways and not others.
[01:06:21] And so, we cannot develop everything.
[01:06:22] - But where is the fools' crutch...
[01:06:25] Well that, the title, sorry about that.
[01:06:26] It was, maybe, ill-appropriate, becase it is not that
[01:06:30] we should not make an energy transition
[01:06:31] but it is the way we talk about energy transition,
[01:06:33] we are going to do it, organize a big national debate.
[01:06:37] We are simply going to put offshore windmills and solar panels,
[01:06:42] it seems to me a bad way to set the issue.
[01:06:45] And for another reason, that i didn't approach yet.
[01:06:47] It is that, if we take the history of energy, what was crucial
[01:06:50] in that history is the change of uses.
[01:06:52] For instance, we start producing electricity to fuel
[01:06:56] the alcohol lamp, Edison's bulb if you wish.
[01:06:59] So, the same way, we extract oil, a bit to light ourselves
[01:07:02] but massively to move ourselves.
[01:07:03] It is because there are new uses,
[01:07:05] that we start use a lot of new primary energy sources,
[01:07:07] or at least increasing the extraction of primary materials.
[01:07:10] The important point is that we first need to think the consumption
[01:07:13] before thinking the production.
[01:07:15] We need to drasticly reduce the energy consumption.
[01:07:18] And then we may think about renewables behind this
[01:07:21] already lowered consumption.
[01:07:23] - I will try to link this with history.
[01:07:26] Actually, I have a question regarding this.
[01:07:28] I will not develop the reasonning behind the statement i make.
[01:07:31] Each will be free to think whatever he/she wants.
[01:07:33] One of the solutions, because we think about realistic solutions
[01:07:35] and it pleases me in your discourse, because we
[01:07:38] often talk of a myth through the transition
[01:07:40] that would consist in saying that thanks to technology,
[01:07:43] we will be able to keep our living confort as it is.
[01:07:46] That according to me, and to many others, it is a complete myth,
[01:07:50] today, well, it is a sweet dream.
[01:07:52] So, according to me and others, one of the only solutions
[01:07:55] to rightfully decrease consumption
[01:07:58] would be to go on a decrease of the GDP.
[01:08:01] To cut the countries' GDP in half.
[01:08:04] That is one of the few realistic solutions today,
[01:08:05] in order to link technology we have to the needs of
[01:08:10] degrowth that we have to try saving the
[01:08:11] demography, well, the people we have today
[01:08:15] on Earth. I wanted to know if, in this regard,
[01:08:17] if historically speaking, there already was,
[01:08:20] at a given moment,
[01:08:21] this idea to reduce general production.
[01:08:25] Because we have always been in an increase of the production.
[01:08:27] Was there a time when, historically,
[01:08:29] there was this hypothesis to say: we need to reduce
[01:08:33] this generalized production to a large scale to continue and go ahead?
[01:08:37] - So reduce, in the 1970', yes.
[01:08:40] Anyway, the idea of a stationnary economy,
[01:08:43] it is something rather old. John Stuart Mill, in the 1860',
[01:08:46] explained that we should stop the growth anyway,
[01:08:49] getting to a plateau in terms of ressources, social bonding, etc.
[01:08:54] There already was this idea that we needed to stop growing.
[01:08:56] So this was something that existed. Then, I don't know if it is realistic
[01:09:00] tu cut in half the GNP.
[01:09:02] I think that the GNP, we already discussed a lot about it but,
[01:09:05] we know it is something really flawed,
[01:09:07] that is bad to measuring well-being.
[01:09:10] If for example somebody invented from one day to another an engine
[01:09:12] which used, I don't know, something free,
[01:09:15] which would only use air to work, I don't know.
[01:09:18] It would reduce the GNP considerably because we wouldn't extract oil anymore.
[01:09:21] We could not tax it, etc. so it would fundamentally reduce the PNB.
[01:09:25] So, I think we need to get out of this debate, to my mind, of this
[01:09:27] growth/degrowth debate and think, once again,
[01:09:29] in terms of technologies and material infrastructures.
[01:09:33] But I agree, it is partially linked.
[01:09:35] We cannot imagine an infinite growth.
[01:09:36] - We are going to take one last question. Go ahead.
[01:09:38] - Yes, thanks. So, you have very well
[01:09:41] demonstrated, a bit earlier, that the development of the car civilization
[01:09:45] was, in a way, consubstantial with the
[01:09:47] urban sprawl and so with the grasp on the cultivable land,
[01:09:53] among other things. That so, we could not today,
[01:09:58] effectively with both these conditions, live withou having one, two,
[01:10:02] even three cars in certain situations.
[01:10:05] That is linked to the fact that we disconnected the place we live and
[01:10:11] the place we produce and work. Today, If you want,
[01:10:15] the amount of energy we consume for transportation,
[01:10:19] regarding the total, could be around 30% to 40%
[01:10:21] - Yes, that is it, roughly. - So, it means that one of the way,
[01:10:25] one the middle/long term to shift paradigm
[01:10:30] in our organisation of the land is to take back
[01:10:35] an organization that would allow the development of cities
[01:10:40] where, at the same time, we put back working places,
[01:10:47] resting places, commerces, public services
[01:10:52] and all this organization which makes that, indeed,
[01:10:58] people live in a context where they feel
[01:11:01] belonging to a life community.
[01:11:05] Ithink that what I say here, it is not saying
[01:11:09] that we will go on spending energy or
[01:11:13] adding energies progressively over time
[01:11:15] on the contrary, I say: let us think back the country planning so
[01:11:20] that the consumption of energy linked to commuting is reduced
[01:11:25] in sensible proportions, thanks.
[01:11:28] - Well, good, I have nothing to add. This is totally true.
[01:11:30] This is the way we should start asking the issue of
[01:11:32] energy transition, yes.
[01:11:33] - Well thank you a lot Jean-Baptiste.
[01:11:35] The talk, indeed, can go on in an informal
[01:11:37] way after, but we have to end the show.
[01:11:40] Thanks a lot.
[01:11:42] [Applause]

Full Transcript

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lO0r5O4-2wU
Translation: fr

[00:15] ARCADIA.
[00:17] ARCADIA LA TRANSITION ÉCOLOGIQUE.
[00:23] Bienvenue à Arcadia, pour cette conférence.
[00:25] qui s'inscrit dans notre cycle sur la transition énergétique.
[00:28] accueillons Jean-Baptiste Fressoz.
[00:30] qui est historien des sciences, des technologies et de l'environnement.
[00:34] Il est également chercheur au CNRS.
[00:36] Il a notamment écrit le livre "L'Apocalypse heureuse".
[00:38] et co-signé "Le choc de l'Anthropocène".
[00:41] Et Jean-Baptiste, vous allez nous parler des enjeux de la transition énergétique.
[00:45] À vous la parole.
[00:47] Merci Julien, je voulais commencer par une petite vidéo.
[00:50] pour rentrer tout de suite dans l'ambiance de ce dont je vais parler.
[01:54] Alors, j'imagine qu'Areva serait surprise de voir qu'ils ont de la publicité gratuite sur Le Média.
[02:02] Non, plus sérieusement, cette publicité est vraiment intéressante pour de nombreuses raisons.
[02:07] Mais il y a une raison fondamentale, c'est qu'elle reflète assez bien notre perception commune de l'histoire de l'énergie.
[02:13] Il y a une chose qui est cruciale dans cette publicité, c'est que nous avons une histoire de l'énergie fondée sur des transitions énergétiques.
[02:21] Elle passe d'un système énergétique à un autre, on peut le voir.
[02:25] Donc durant l'Antiquité, si je me souviens bien, c'est la voile, donc l'énergie éolienne.
[02:29] Puis durant le Moyen Âge, cela devient l'énergie hydraulique.
[02:33] La révolution industrielle, en effet, en Angleterre avec le charbon.
[02:37] Le pétrole aux États-Unis, avec un cinéma drive-in.
[02:40] Et puis viennent les temps bénis d'aujourd'hui, puisqu'il y a une scène où le ciel est très gris, gâché par la pollution quand c'est l'Angleterre,
[02:47] et nous arrivons au monde contemporain, qui se déroule, on peut l'imaginer, dans un Rio de Janeiro mythifié,
[02:56] où l'on fait principalement la fête, et comme nous avons de l'énergie...
[03:00] Nous avons donc un mélange de vent, de solaire et évidemment de nucléaire
[03:03] puisqu'il s'agit d'une publicité pour Areva qui, soit dit en passant, a été réalisée en 2011, à une époque où Areva va mal après Fukushima.
[03:12] D'où cette nécessité de se réinscrire dans une sorte de grande histoire du progrès et de mettre en place une histoire de l'énergie dans une histoire du progrès.
[03:20] Ainsi, cette histoire de l'énergie, fondée sur la notion de transition, c'est le sujet que j'aimerais aborder et traiter à travers une histoire un peu plus travaillée de notre passé énergétique.
[03:34] S'il y a une chose que l'histoire de l'énergie nous apprend, c'est qu'il n'y a jamais eu de transition énergétique dans le passé.
[03:44] C'est, au final, la mauvaise nouvelle que l'on peut tirer de l'histoire de l'énergie.
[03:50] C'est que cette transition énergétique que l'on se réjouit, que l'on souhaite voir advenir, qu'il faut faire d'urgence essentiellement pour des raisons climatiques, il n'y a pas de précédent.
[04:00] Le point fondamental est que, contrairement à ce que nous dit Areva, nous ne passons pas d'un système énergétique à un autre.
[04:06] Autrement dit, nous ne passons pas, par exemple, du bois au charbon, puis du charbon au pétrole, puis du pétrole à quelque chose d'autre qui serait le nucléaire, l'éolien, le solaire, le renouvelable, etc.
[04:17] Nous n'avons fait qu'ajouter des sources d'énergie dans le passé les unes sur les autres.
[04:22] – Merci Julien pour la diapositive –
[04:24] C'est exactement ce que montre cette diapositive.
[04:27] Vous avez les émissions de CO2 de diverses sources d'énergie.
[04:34] Et nous voyons par exemple, que les émissions de CO2 du charbon n'ont jamais été aussi élevées qu'aujourd'hui.
[04:40] Donc nous ne passons pas d'un mix énergétique bois, puis charbon, puis pétrole.
[04:45] Nous passons d'un mix énergétique bois puis bois-charbon puis bois-charbon-pétrole.
[04:51] À ce moment les renouvelables, ils ajoutent seulement une petite couche d'énergie primaire sur un mix énergétique qui repose encore fondamentalement sur le carbone.
[05:02] Le point crucial que nous devons garder à l'esprit
[05:03] c'est que nous avons aussi une vision – comment dire –
[05:07] « phasiste » de l'histoire des technologies.
[05:08] Comme si nous passions d'une technologie à une autre.
[05:10] En fait, si nous regardons vraiment ce qu'est l'histoire des technologies.
[05:13] on peut voir que l'histoire des technologies est fondamentalement additive.
[05:16] Nous ajoutons des niveaux technologiques les uns sur les autres, et cela est particulièrement vrai pour les technologies énergétiques
[05:23] car nous n'avons jamais brûlé autant de charbon et de pétrole qu'aujourd'hui.
[05:27] Le mix énergétique repose à 85% sur les fossiles ;
[05:32] sur le charbon et le pétrole.
[05:34] Donc, sur les technologies du 19ème et 20ème siècle.
[05:38] Le pic de charbon n'est pas celui du 19ème siècle.
[05:41] Ce n'est même pas celui des années 1950.
[05:43] C'est peut-être maintenant, personne ne sait.
[05:46] Nous ne savons pas du tout.
[05:48] L'idée que nous sortons maintenant du charbon pour l'électricité,
[05:53] c'est quelque chose de voulu, de souhaité,
[05:55] mis sur papier, par exemple lors de la COP 21.
[05:59] Mais en fait, nous sommes incapables de prédire ce qui va se passer en Inde,
[06:03] au Pakistan, en Afrique avec la croissance économique.
[06:06] Il n'est pas du tout impossible que les émissions liées à la combustion du charbon augmentent.
[06:12] Je vais vous donner un exemple qui me semble révélateur.
[06:15] C'est une mine qui a fait parler d'elle en Australie : la mine Carmichael.
[06:20] Je ne sais pas si vous avez entendu parler de cette mine.
[06:20] Elle a fait parler d'elle parce que pour en extraire du charbon, il faudra forer la Grande Barrière de corail.
[06:29] Ça, effectivement, a fait tiquer tous les écologistes et même au-delà.
[06:34] Mais, à dire vrai, le point fondamental n'est pas de percer un trou dans la barrière de corail.
[06:37] C'est que cette seule mine en Australie devrait extraire, quand elle tournera, 60 millions de tonnes de charbon.
[06:45] Alors 60 millions de tonnes de charbon par an, on n'arrive pas à se représenter ce que ça représente.
[06:50] Pour avoir une idée à peu près, il se trouve qu'il y a un exemple qui parle de lui-même.
[06:53] C'est le pic du charbon en Angleterre en 1911.
[06:59] La période où on extrait le plus de charbon en Angleterre, c'est 200 millions de tonnes.
[07:03] Dans toute l'Angleterre.
[07:03] Le Royaume-Uni tout entier, devrais-je dire.
[07:05] Avec une seule mine en Australie, où il n'y aura que quelques centaines d'ouvriers, nous extrairons autant de charbon que l'Angleterre au début du 20e siècle, alors qu'il y avait environ un million de mineurs.
[07:17] Donc, nous avons vraiment des quantités considérables de charbon, en effet, en stock.
[07:23] Le charbon est très abondamment utilisé pour produire de l'électricité.
[07:27] Donc, il n'y a aucune raison de penser à une transition rapide.
[07:30] La Chine, qui a été la principale raison de l'augmentation du charbon ces trente dernières années, estime atteindre son plafond d'émissions de CO2 en 2030.
[07:45] Cela cause donc de nombreux problèmes... Car quand on regarde, à peu près, au niveau national, le gouvernement chinois s'engage à faire beaucoup de choses importantes en ce qui concerne les conférences internationales.
[07:54] Et puis après, au niveau des provinces chinoises, le gouvernement central donne des objectifs vraiment ambitieux concernant le chômage, la croissance économique, à chaque province.
[08:04] Et l'une des meilleures façons d'atteindre ces objectifs pour les gouverneurs de province est de construire des bâtiments.
[08:10] Il y a cette chose qui fonctionne très bien pour employer la population, c'est de construire des infrastructures, et encore plus d'infrastructures.
[08:15] Et le ciment et la construction consomment énormément d'énergie et émettent du CO2.
[08:18] Et l'énergie provient souvent du charbon.
[08:24] Nous avons un problème vraiment manifeste qui est, d'une part, la stabilité politique et sociale en Chine, et d'autre part, les émissions de CO2.
[08:32] Et si les entreprises chinoises spécialisées dans la production d'énergie à base de charbon, de centrales électriques au charbon, décident de réduire leurs investissements en Chine, tout le capital investi en savoir-faire, en technologies, alors nous devons les utiliser.
[08:47] Alors concrètement, que va-t-il se passer.
[08:49] Nous avons des tonnes de projets à l'étude au Pakistan, en Éthiopie, en Afrique en général.
[08:54] Donc, nous n'avons vraiment aucune raison de croire que nous allons atteindre le pic de charbon.
[09:01] Donc, je ne parlerai même pas du pétrole, évidemment.
[09:03] Puisque le pétrole, même s'il y a des moments où l'on pense à
[09:07] Atteindre un plateau en termes de consommation et d'extraction de pétrole.
[09:11] En fait, nous savons qu'il existe encore d'énormes réserves.
[09:14] En particulier au nord de la Sibérie.
[09:17] Je vous recommande un livre de Jean-Michel Valantin intitulé "Géopolitique d'une planète déréglée".
[09:22] Il a écrit des pages absolument fascinantes
[09:24] des pages sur ce qui se passe dans le Grand Nord sibérien.
[09:27] Avec des investissements absolument gigantesques, venant notamment de Chine,
[09:31] afin de développer d'immenses plateformes pétrolières au nord de la Russie.
[09:40] Un autre exemple qui me semble frappant montrant que nous vivons encore, au final,
[09:45] un développement qui repose fondamentalement sur le fossile,
[09:49] c'est que l'été dernier, en août 2017, un événement absolument crucial
[09:56] dans l'histoire de la mondialisation a eu lieu.
[09:58] C'est la première fois qu'un navire commercial
[10:02] traverse le nord de la Sibérie pour atteindre l'Asie.
[10:08] D'Europe en Asie sans passer par le canal de Suez mais en passant par le Grand Nord.
[10:12] C'est évidemment lié au réchauffement climatique
[10:16] que cette route est exploitable sans brise-glace.
[10:19] Ce navire s'appelait... Avez-vous une idée de comment il s'appelait ?
[10:23] - Santa Maria, non ? - Non, le Christophe de Margerie
[10:26] Christophe de Margerie, ancien PDG de Total,
[10:29] qui est mort dans un crash d'avion en Russie.
[10:32] Pourquoi ? Parce que c'est un méthanier.
[10:34] Donc un navire qui transporte des millions de mètres cubes
[10:38] de méthane liquide
[10:39] et qui permettra le développement économique majeur,
[10:44] vraisemblablement, du nord de la Russie.
[10:44] Donc, avec ces quelques exemples
[10:50] d'ajouts énergétiques récents, en termes d'énergies fossiles,
[10:54] montrent particulièrement que, de toute évidence, nous ne sommes pas du tout sortis des énergies fossiles.
[10:58] Que depuis, environ trente ans, nous parlons de changement climatique
[11:02] et de transition énergétique, du mix énergétique mondial,
[11:05] environ, nous étions à 88% d'énergies fossiles dans les années 1980.
[11:09] Nous sommes à 87% maintenant.
[11:09] C'est-à-dire que c'est parfaitement stable.
[11:12] Et puis deuxièmement, ce qu'il est important de garder à l'esprit, c'est que dans ces questions de changement climatique et de transition énergétique, il faut noter qu'il n'y a pas une seule planète, il n'y a pas une seule humanité, responsable et impactée dans son ensemble par ce changement climatique.
[11:27] Au lieu de cela, nous avons des inégalités profondes, des gagnants et des perdants.
[11:31] Et la Russie fait évidemment partie des gagnants du changement climatique.
[11:34] Puisque ce changement climatique permettra de faire ressortir des ressources naturelles prodigieuses qui, en plus, ne font qu'aggraver le problème.
[11:41] Donc, ces exemples montrent bien que nous sommes encore, au final, pleinement dans les énergies fossiles.
[11:46] Plus important encore, nous ne pouvons pas nous attendre à ce que la flambée des prix du pétrole nous sorte d'affaire.
[11:51] C'est-à-dire qu'il y a un discours, qui vient souvent des décroissants, qui dit que de toute façon nous allons atteindre des limites naturelles.
[12:00] Nous n'avons pas assez de pétrole pour poursuivre le développement économique tel que nous le connaissons.
[12:05] C'est très probablement vrai à long terme, mais à moyen terme, qui est celui qui intéresse pour les questions de changement climatique, c'est faux.
[12:11] Nous réalisons qu'il reste encore beaucoup de déchets à brûler.
[12:13] Et nous avons absolument des réserves considérables de pétrole encore sous nos pieds.
[12:20] Un chiffre, peut-être... Oui ?
[12:22] Je me demandais s'il y avait des exemples où il y a eu un changement énergétique majeur et s'il y a peut-être des exemples surprenants...
[12:30] Oui, bien sûr, je termine juste sur ce point.
[12:34] Mais grosso modo, pour ne pas dépasser les fameux deux degrés en 2100, il faut laisser sous nos pieds les trois quarts des réserves prouvées de pétrole, de gaz et de charbon.
[12:48] Si vous voulez, le problème fondamental n'est pas un problème de manque d'énergie, de manque de combustibles fossiles qui entraînera la flambée.
[12:54] C'était vraiment la grande peur des écologistes dans les années 1970.
[12:58] Nous réalisons qu'avec la question du changement climatique, au final, le mur climatique arrive beaucoup plus tôt que le mur des ressources.
[13:04] Donc cela ne veut pas dire qu'il n'y a jamais eu de transition énergétique.
[13:06] Et en effet, Julien a raison de souligner le fait qu'il y a eu, tout au long de l'histoire, des transitions énergétiques brutales et soudaines.
[13:14] Mais malheureusement, ce n'est pas agréable à voir.
[13:17] Si nous voulons prendre des exemples concrets, les moments de forte baisse des émissions de CO2 sont des moments de crises économiques majeures.
[13:24] La Grande Dépression est une période où, mondialement, les émissions de CO2 diminuent fortement.
[13:30] La Seconde Guerre mondiale, pour les pays perdants, par exemple l'Allemagne en 1945 connaît une magnifique transition énergétique, mais bon...
[13:37] Nous avons deux exemples plus récents qui sont plus intéressants.
[13:42] Ce sont les cas de Cuba et de la Corée du Nord.
[13:46] Deux pays vraiment différents.
[13:48] Sous des régimes communistes, mais vraiment différents de toute façon.
[13:51] Qui sont confrontés au même problème, à savoir qu'en 1992, on leur refuse le pétrole bon marché que l'URSS leur fournissait pour assurer leur influence géopolitique.
[14:03] Et ces deux pays font des choix très distincts.
[14:06] Le cas le plus dramatique est celui de la Corée du Nord, car elle avait une agriculture très intensive en intrants, en engrais et en pesticides qui sont très gourmands en énergie.
[14:16] Et puis le gouvernement nord-coréen a fait le choix d'alimenter son complexe militaro-industriel en électricité.
[14:22] Cela a conduit à une catastrophe, enfin, une énorme pénurie alimentaire.
[14:25] Nous ne savons pas exactement combien de personnes sont mortes, mais les estimations sont d'environ 5 % à 10 % de la population nord-coréenne qui est décédée en une dizaine d'années.
[14:32] Donc vraiment, une grande catastrophe démographique.
[14:35] L'autre exemple est un peu plus rassurant, mais pas tant que ça.
[14:39] C'est l'exemple de Cuba.
[14:41] Cuba alors, même problème, ils ont profité d'un pétrole bon marché venant de l'URSS et en 1992, ils sont entrés dans ce que nous appelons "El Periodo especial", la période spéciale.
[14:54] Une période de crise économique profonde, de véritable souffrance aussi pour les Cubains.
[15:00] Nous estimons que les Cubains, à la suite de ce changement économique majeur, d'être privés de pétrole bon marché, ou de toute façon d'avoir beaucoup moins de pétrole, ont perdu en moyenne 5 kg par individu.
[15:13] On peut donc le voir à travers le corps des Cubains.
[15:15] Les émissions de CO2 ont diminué, si je me souviens bien, de 60 %.
[15:18] Ce n'est donc pas mal, mais c'est moins que ce dont nous avons besoin.
[15:22] Pour ne pas dépasser les 2 degrés en 2100,
[15:25] nous devrions réduire nos émissions de CO2 de 80 %.
[15:27] Dans les pays riches et en France en particulier.
[15:29] C'est donc vraiment quelque chose de massif que nous devons faire.
[15:31] Ainsi, à Cuba, ils en ont fait moins, ils ont quand même perdu beaucoup de poids.
[15:35] L'aspect positif était que les maladies cardiovasculaires ont fortement diminué.
[15:38] De nombreux épidémiologistes étudient le cas de Cuba.
[15:41] pour voir ce que fait concrètement une transition énergétique
[15:43] en termes de santé publique.
[15:44] Parce que les Cubains ont beaucoup plus marché, utilisé le vélo...
[15:47] Eh bien, ils ont dû transformer profondément leur économie.
[15:50] Si cette période spéciale s'est terminée quand
[15:52] Cuba a obtenu le soutien du Venezuela
[15:55] et du pétrole bon marché, mal raffiné d'ailleurs,
[15:58] Ce qui a entraîné une série de problèmes environnementaux.
[16:01] Disons qu'ils sont sortis de cette période spéciale
[16:06] au début des années 2000.
[16:08] Donc, vraiment, nous devrions être prudents quant à ce concept de transition énergétique.
[16:11] C'est un peu le sens de cette introduction.
[16:13] C'est-à-dire ce concept vraiment unanimiste,
[16:16] Je veux dire, qui est contre une transition écologique ?
[16:19] Le ministère s'appelle désormais « Ministère de la Transition Écologique et Inclusive ».
[16:22] Tout le monde est d'accord, c'est très, très gentil.
[16:23] Il y a un point de vue naïf à cela.
[16:25] Mais il faut voir concrètement ce que signifie une vraie transition énergétique.
[16:29] Il faut voir que ce que l'on espère...
[16:32] N'est en fait jamais arrivé.
[16:35] On ne peut pas se référer à un exemple du passé et dire :
[16:37] Là, il faudrait faire comme ça.
[16:39] Et ça, c'est quelque chose de très, très profond.
[16:43] Alors pourquoi faut-il faire attention à cette phrase de transition énergétique ?
[16:46] Ce point est un peu plus spécifique.
[16:49] Il faut voir d'où ça vient.
[16:51] En tant qu'historien, j'aime savoir d'où viennent les concepts qui traînent, qui circulent et qui soudain gagnent l'adhésion du plus grand nombre.
[17:00] Les premières occurrences de la phrase « transition énergétique » sont en anglais : « energy transition ».
[17:06] C'est en anglais, dans les années 70, en 1973 précisément.
[17:09] Et ce qui est intéressant, c'est de voir qu'elle remplace une autre phrase.
[17:12] Une phrase beaucoup plus problématique qui était celle de « crise énergétique ».
[17:18] Ou « energy gap ».
[17:21] Ces deux expressions ont beaucoup été utilisées après 1972, 1973, suite au choc pétrolier.
[17:26] Et puis il y a eu la prise de conscience que les États-Unis avaient dépassé leur pic de pétrole conventionnel.
[17:31] Il faut revenir sur ces années 1973-1974, sous la présidence de Jimmy Carter, à une époque où il y avait une vraie peur liée à l'approvisionnement énergétique des États-Unis.
[17:42] Jimmy Carter, le président américain, a fait plusieurs discours à la nation.
[17:47] Vous savez, ces grands discours solennels à la Maison Blanche.
[17:50] Sur le thème de la transition énergétique.
[17:52] Si je me souviens bien, on a un discours très célèbre qui s'appelle "Le discours sur le malaise".
[17:57] Un discours ultra-déprimant.
[17:58] Vraiment surprenant de voir que le président américain fasse un tel discours casse-ambiance.
[18:05] Je crois que c'est en 1973, où il explique qu'on ne peut pas continuer comme ça.
[18:09] Que l'identité américaine a été complètement pervertie par le consumérisme.
[18:13] Que maintenant, les Américains se définissent par ce qu'ils possèdent et non par ce qu'ils sont et les valeurs chrétiennes du travail puritain, etc.
[18:20] Donc un discours vraiment culpabilisant envers l'Américain.
[18:24] Il explique que les Américains devront très probablement renoncer aux voitures individuelles, reprendre le bus et les transports en commun.
[18:29] Donc, un discours très pessimiste sur l'avenir économique.
[18:33] Nous sommes vraiment dans une atmosphère presque... apocalyptique serait trop fort mais en tout cas assez déprimée, disons, aux États-Unis.
[18:41] Ce discours sur la transition énergétique vient d'abord contrer cette anxiété, cette peur, cette détresse mentale vraiment très forte qui est liée à la pénurie d'énergie.
[18:51] Le discours sur la transition énergétique est de dire : nous avons des solutions.
[18:55] Ne vous inquiétez pas, il existe des solutions technologiques, des solutions économiques, nous allons nous en charger.
[19:00] Il s'agit de rendre ce problème gérable et de transformer ce problème de crise énergétique, qui est un problème existentiel pour les économies développées, en un simple problème de gestion du développement économique.
[19:13] Ce qui est intéressant de voir, c'est qu'au début, la transition énergétique, dans les premiers textes, qui vient d'ailleurs de l'administration américaine de l'énergie, d'une commission tripartite, organisation qui regroupe
[19:24] L'Europe occidentale, les États-Unis et le Japon.
[19:27] Le ministre suédois de l'Avenir, qui est très doué pour prospecter sur le long terme.
[19:32] Et donc, ces institutions sont tout sauf environnementales.
[19:34] Ce sont plutôt les fers de lance de l'Occident développé et industrialisé qui cherchent à gérer les ressources de la Terre.
[19:41] Ces institutions expliquent que la transition énergétique passe d'abord par le nucléaire.
[19:47] En gros, il s'agit vraiment de faire de gros investissements dans l'énergie nucléaire.
[19:50] À ce stade, il y a des rapports, la commission européenne qui explique que la transition énergétique en Europe consiste à opérer un virage vers l'énergie nucléaire qui permettra de redonner une souveraineté énergétique à la communauté européenne.
[20:04] Il s'agit déjà de pétrole et de gaz de fractionnement, et pire encore, de la transformation du charbon en pétrole.
[20:12] Ainsi, la liquéfaction du charbon est sans l'ombre d'un doute la technologie la plus redoutable en termes d'émissions de CO2 à laquelle on puisse penser.
[20:18] Elle consiste à prendre du charbon et à le transformer, avec beaucoup d'énergie provenant du charbon, en carburant liquide.
[20:22] C'est une technologie
[20:26] qui avait été développé par l'Allemagne nazie
[20:28] parce qu'elle craignait d'être coupée de ses approvisionnements en pétrole.
[20:32] C'était donc une technologie de guerre autarcique
[20:35] qui pouvait avoir du sens dans ce contexte.
[20:39] Mais qui n'a évidemment aucun sens dans les années 1970
[20:41] en Europe occidentale ou aux États-Unis.
[20:44] Voici donc ce qu'est la transition énergétique.
[20:45] Soit dit en passant, le fait qu'il s'agisse de l'énergie nucléaire,
[20:49] je n'en ai aucune preuve, mais c'est que "transition énergétique"
[20:51] a une signification en physique nucléaire.
[20:52] C'est un électron passant d'un état à un autre autour d'un atome.
[20:54] Je ne peux pas en dire beaucoup plus à ce sujet.
[20:56] Mais c'est d'abord un terme de physique nucléaire.
[20:58] Donc, il n'est pas du tout impossible que des ingénieurs atomiques pro-nucléaires aient inventé,
[21:04] au final, dans le discours commun et dans notre façon de penser
[21:09] ce terme de "transition énergétique". Ce qui est une fois de plus
[21:12] très problématique car historiquement
[21:13] cela ne fait référence à rien.
[21:13] Alors, cela signifie-t-il
[21:16] que l'histoire que je voulais vous raconter est absolument
[21:18] dépressionnaire et qu'il n'y a aucun espoir ?
[21:21] Ce pourrait être la morale finale, je ne sais pas.
[21:25] Je ne suis pas sûr de moi, quant à la morale de cette histoire de l'énergie.

Full Transcript (Bilingual)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lO0r5O4-2wU
Translation: fr

[00:15] ARCADIA.
ARCADIA.

[00:17] ARCADIA THE ECOLOGICAL TRANSITION.
ARCADIA LA TRANSITION ÉCOLOGIQUE.

[00:23] Welcome to Arcadia, for this conference.
Bienvenue à Arcadia, pour cette conférence.

[00:25] which is part of our cycle about energy transition.
qui s'inscrit dans notre cycle sur la transition énergétique.

[00:28] let us welcome Jean-Baptiste Fressoz.
accueillons Jean-Baptiste Fressoz.

[00:30] who is an historian of sciences, technologies and environment.
qui est historien des sciences, des technologies et de l'environnement.

[00:34] He is also a researcher at CNRS.
Il est également chercheur au CNRS.

[00:36] He notably wrote the book "The Happy Apocalypse".
Il a notamment écrit le livre "L'Apocalypse heureuse".

[00:38] and coauthored "The shock of the Anthropocene".
et co-signé "Le choc de l'Anthropocène".

[00:41] And Jean-Baptiste, you are going to talk about energy transition issues.
Et Jean-Baptiste, vous allez nous parler des enjeux de la transition énergétique.

[00:45] Over to you.
À vous la parole.

[00:47] Thank you Julien, I wanted to start with a little video.
Merci Julien, je voulais commencer par une petite vidéo.

[00:50] to get right away in the mood of what I am going to talk about.
pour rentrer tout de suite dans l'ambiance de ce dont je vais parler.

[01:54] So, I imagine that Areva would be suprised to see that they have free advertisement on Le Média.
Alors, j'imagine qu'Areva serait surprise de voir qu'ils ont de la publicité gratuite sur Le Média.

[02:02] No, more seriously, this ad is really interresting for many reasons.
Non, plus sérieusement, cette publicité est vraiment intéressante pour de nombreuses raisons.

[02:07] But there is one fundamental reason, it is that it reflects well enough our common perception of the history of energy.
Mais il y a une raison fondamentale, c'est qu'elle reflète assez bien notre perception commune de l'histoire de l'énergie.

[02:13] There is one thing that is crucial in this ad, it is that we have a history of energy funded upon energy transitions.
Il y a une chose qui est cruciale dans cette publicité, c'est que nous avons une histoire de l'énergie fondée sur des transitions énergétiques.

[02:21] It goes from an energy system to another, we can see it.
Elle passe d'un système énergétique à un autre, on peut le voir.

[02:25] So during Antiquity, if I reckon well, it is sail, so wind power.
Donc durant l'Antiquité, si je me souviens bien, c'est la voile, donc l'énergie éolienne.

[02:29] Then during the Middle Ages, it becomes water power.
Puis durant le Moyen Âge, cela devient l'énergie hydraulique.

[02:33] The industrial revolution, indeed, in England with coal.
La révolution industrielle, en effet, en Angleterre avec le charbon.

[02:37] Oil in the USA, with a drive-in theater.
Le pétrole aux États-Unis, avec un cinéma drive-in.

[02:40] And then comes the blessed times of nowadays, since there is a scene where the sky is very grey, spoiled by pollution when this is England,
Et puis viennent les temps bénis d'aujourd'hui, puisqu'il y a une scène où le ciel est très gris, gâché par la pollution quand c'est l'Angleterre,

[02:47] and we come to the contemporary world, which happens, we can imagine, in a mythified Rio de Janeiro,
et nous arrivons au monde contemporain, qui se déroule, on peut l'imaginer, dans un Rio de Janeiro mythifié,

[02:56] where one mainly parties, and since we have energy...
où l'on fait principalement la fête, et comme nous avons de l'énergie...

[03:00] So we have a mix of wind, solar and obviously nuclear
Nous avons donc un mélange de vent, de solaire et évidemment de nucléaire

[03:03] since it is an ad for Areva which, incidentally, has been made in 2011, at a time when Areva goes wrong after Fukushima.
puisqu'il s'agit d'une publicité pour Areva qui, soit dit en passant, a été réalisée en 2011, à une époque où Areva va mal après Fukushima.

[03:12] Hence this necessity to re-enrol in a kind of big history of progress and to set up a history of energy in a history of progress.
D'où cette nécessité de se réinscrire dans une sorte de grande histoire du progrès et de mettre en place une histoire de l'énergie dans une histoire du progrès.

[03:20] Thus, this history of energy, funded upon the notion of transition, it is the topic I would like to discuss and tackle through a little more crafted history about our energy past.
Ainsi, cette histoire de l'énergie, fondée sur la notion de transition, c'est le sujet que j'aimerais aborder et traiter à travers une histoire un peu plus travaillée de notre passé énergétique.

[03:34] If there is one thing that the history of energy teaches us, It is that there never was an energy transition in the past.
S'il y a une chose que l'histoire de l'énergie nous apprend, c'est qu'il n'y a jamais eu de transition énergétique dans le passé.

[03:44] This is, in the end, the bad news, that we can learn from the history of energy.
C'est, au final, la mauvaise nouvelle que l'on peut tirer de l'histoire de l'énergie.

[03:50] It is that this energy transition that we delight in, that we want to happen, that needs to happen urgently essencially for climate reasons, there is no precedent.
C'est que cette transition énergétique que l'on se réjouit, que l'on souhaite voir advenir, qu'il faut faire d'urgence essentiellement pour des raisons climatiques, il n'y a pas de précédent.

[04:00] The fundamental point is that, contrarily to what Areva tells us, we don't go from an energy system to another.
Le point fondamental est que, contrairement à ce que nous dit Areva, nous ne passons pas d'un système énergétique à un autre.

[04:06] Said differently, we don't go, for example, from wood to coal, then from coal to oil, the from oil to something else that would be nuclear, wind, solar, renewable, etc.
Autrement dit, nous ne passons pas, par exemple, du bois au charbon, puis du charbon au pétrole, puis du pétrole à quelque chose d'autre qui serait le nucléaire, l'éolien, le solaire, le renouvelable, etc.

[04:17] We only additionned energy sources in the past the ones upon the others.
Nous n'avons fait qu'ajouter des sources d'énergie dans le passé les unes sur les autres.

[04:22] – Thank you Julien for the slide –
– Merci Julien pour la diapositive –

[04:24] That is exactly what this slide shows.
C'est exactement ce que montre cette diapositive.

[04:27] You have the CO2 emissions from diverse energy sources.
Vous avez les émissions de CO2 de diverses sources d'énergie.

[04:34] And we see for example, that coal CO2 emissions have never been higher than now.
Et nous voyons par exemple, que les émissions de CO2 du charbon n'ont jamais été aussi élevées qu'aujourd'hui.

[04:40] So we don't go from an energy mix wood, then coal, the oil.
Donc nous ne passons pas d'un mix énergétique bois, puis charbon, puis pétrole.

[04:45] We go from an energy mix wood then wood-coal then wood-coal-oil.
Nous passons d'un mix énergétique bois puis bois-charbon puis bois-charbon-pétrole.

[04:51] At this moment renewables, they only add up a little layer of primary energy upon an energy mix which still fundamentally relies on carbon.
À ce moment les renouvelables, ils ajoutent seulement une petite couche d'énergie primaire sur un mix énergétique qui repose encore fondamentalement sur le carbone.

[05:02] The crucial point we need to keep in mind
Le point crucial que nous devons garder à l'esprit

[05:03] is that we have a vision too – how to put it –
c'est que nous avons aussi une vision – comment dire –

[05:07] "phasist" of history of technologies.
« phasiste » de l'histoire des technologies.

[05:08] As if we went from a technology to another.
Comme si nous passions d'une technologie à une autre.

[05:10] In fact, if we look for real what is history of technologies.
En fait, si nous regardons vraiment ce qu'est l'histoire des technologies.

[05:13] we can see that history of technologies is fundamentaly additive.
on peut voir que l'histoire des technologies est fondamentalement additive.

[05:16] We add technological levels on one another, and that is especially true for energy technologies
Nous ajoutons des niveaux technologiques les uns sur les autres, et cela est particulièrement vrai pour les technologies énergétiques

[05:23] as we never burnt as much coal and oil as now.
car nous n'avons jamais brûlé autant de charbon et de pétrole qu'aujourd'hui.

[05:27] The energy mix lies at 85% on fossils;
Le mix énergétique repose à 85% sur les fossiles ;

[05:32] on coal and oil.
sur le charbon et le pétrole.

[05:34] So, on 19th and 20th century technologies.
Donc, sur les technologies du 19ème et 20ème siècle.

[05:38] The coal spike isn't the 19th century.
Le pic de charbon n'est pas celui du 19ème siècle.

[05:41] It is not even the 1950'.
Ce n'est même pas celui des années 1950.

[05:43] It may be now, nobody knows.
C'est peut-être maintenant, personne ne sait.

[05:46] We don't know at all.
Nous ne savons pas du tout.

[05:48] The idea that we are now getting out of coal for electricity,
L'idée que nous sortons maintenant du charbon pour l'électricité,

[05:53] it is something wanted, wished,
c'est quelque chose de voulu, de souhaité,

[05:55] put on paper, for example during the COP 21.
mis sur papier, par exemple lors de la COP 21.

[05:59] But in fact, we are unable to predict what is going to happen in India,
Mais en fait, nous sommes incapables de prédire ce qui va se passer en Inde,

[06:03] in Pakistan, in Africa with the economic growth.
au Pakistan, en Afrique avec la croissance économique.

[06:06] It is not impossible at all that emissions linked to coal combustion increase.
Il n'est pas du tout impossible que les émissions liées à la combustion du charbon augmentent.

[06:12] I am going to give you an example that seems revealing to me.
Je vais vous donner un exemple qui me semble révélateur.

[06:15] It is a mine that made a fuss in Australia: the Carmichael mine.
C'est une mine qui a fait parler d'elle en Australie : la mine Carmichael.

[06:20] I don't know if you heard about this mine.
Je ne sais pas si vous avez entendu parler de cette mine.

[06:20] It made a fuss because to extract coal from it it will be necessary to drill the Great Barrier Reef.
Elle a fait parler d'elle parce que pour en extraire du charbon, il faudra forer la Grande Barrière de corail.

[06:29] That, indeed, made every environmentalist flinch and even further.
Ça, effectivement, a fait tiquer tous les écologistes et même au-delà.

[06:34] But, to tell the truth, the fundamental point is not to drill a hole in the barrier reef.
Mais, à dire vrai, le point fondamental n'est pas de percer un trou dans la barrière de corail.

[06:37] It is that this only mine in Australia should extract, when it will be running, 60 million metric tons of coal.
C'est que cette seule mine en Australie devrait extraire, quand elle tournera, 60 millions de tonnes de charbon.

[06:45] So 60 million metric tons of coal a year, we cannot figure what it represents.
Alors 60 millions de tonnes de charbon par an, on n'arrive pas à se représenter ce que ça représente.

[06:50] To get a rough estimate, it happens that there is one example that speaks for itself.
Pour avoir une idée à peu près, il se trouve qu'il y a un exemple qui parle de lui-même.

[06:53] It is the coal spike in England in 1911.
C'est le pic du charbon en Angleterre en 1911.

[06:59] The period when we extract the most coal in England, it's 200 million tons.
La période où on extrait le plus de charbon en Angleterre, c'est 200 millions de tonnes.

[07:03] In the whole England.
Dans toute l'Angleterre.

[07:03] The whole United Kingdom should I say.
Le Royaume-Uni tout entier, devrais-je dire.

[07:05] With one single mine in Australia, where there only will be several hundreds workers, we will extract as much coal as England at the beginning of the 20th century when there were around a million miners.
Avec une seule mine en Australie, où il n'y aura que quelques centaines d'ouvriers, nous extrairons autant de charbon que l'Angleterre au début du 20e siècle, alors qu'il y avait environ un million de mineurs.

[07:17] Si we really have considerable amounts of coal, indeed, in stock.
Donc, nous avons vraiment des quantités considérables de charbon, en effet, en stock.

[07:23] Coal is very abundantly used to produce electricity.
Le charbon est très abondamment utilisé pour produire de l'électricité.

[07:27] Si there is no reason to think about a quick transition.
Donc, il n'y a aucune raison de penser à une transition rapide.

[07:30] China, which has been the main reason for the increase of coal these last thirty years, China estimates reaching its CO2 emission cap in 2030.
La Chine, qui a été la principale raison de l'augmentation du charbon ces trente dernières années, estime atteindre son plafond d'émissions de CO2 en 2030.

[07:45] So that cause many problems... Because when we look, roughly, at the national level, the Chinese government commits to do many important things when it comes to international conferences.
Cela cause donc de nombreux problèmes... Car quand on regarde, à peu près, au niveau national, le gouvernement chinois s'engage à faire beaucoup de choses importantes en ce qui concerne les conférences internationales.

[07:54] And then after, at the level of Chinese provinces, the central government give really ambitious targets regarding unemployment, economic growth, to each province.
Et puis après, au niveau des provinces chinoises, le gouvernement central donne des objectifs vraiment ambitieux concernant le chômage, la croissance économique, à chaque province.

[08:04] And one of the best ways to fulfil these tagets for the province governors, is to do buildings.
Et l'une des meilleures façons d'atteindre ces objectifs pour les gouverneurs de province est de construire des bâtiments.

[08:10] There is this one thing that works great to employ the population, it is to build infrastructures, and even more infrastructures.
Il y a cette chose qui fonctionne très bien pour employer la population, c'est de construire des infrastructures, et encore plus d'infrastructures.

[08:15] And ciment and building are tremendously energy consuming and CO2 emitting.
Et le ciment et la construction consomment énormément d'énergie et émettent du CO2.

[08:18] And the energy often comes from coal.
Et l'énergie provient souvent du charbon.

[08:24] We have a really manifest issue that is, on the one hand, political and social stability in China, and on the other hand, CO2 emissions.
Nous avons un problème vraiment manifeste qui est, d'une part, la stabilité politique et sociale en Chine, et d'autre part, les émissions de CO2.

[08:32] And then if chinese companies that are specialized in the production of coal-based power, of coal-fired power station, decide to downsize their investment in China, all the capital invested in know-hows, in technologies, then we have to use them.
Et si les entreprises chinoises spécialisées dans la production d'énergie à base de charbon, de centrales électriques au charbon, décident de réduire leurs investissements en Chine, tout le capital investi en savoir-faire, en technologies, alors nous devons les utiliser.

[08:47] So concretely what is going to happen.
Alors concrètement, que va-t-il se passer.

[08:49] We have tons of projects that are at study in Pakistan, in Ethiopia, in Africa in general.
Nous avons des tonnes de projets à l'étude au Pakistan, en Éthiopie, en Afrique en général.

[08:54] So, we really don't have any reason to believe that we're going to reach the coal spike.
Donc, nous n'avons vraiment aucune raison de croire que nous allons atteindre le pic de charbon.

[09:01] So I will not even talk about oil, obviously.
Donc, je ne parlerai même pas du pétrole, évidemment.

[09:03] Since oil, even if there are moments we think about
Puisque le pétrole, même s'il y a des moments où l'on pense à

[09:07] Reaching a plateau in terms of consumption and extraction of oil.
Atteindre un plateau en termes de consommation et d'extraction de pétrole.

[09:11] Actually, we know there are still tremendous reserves.
En fait, nous savons qu'il existe encore d'énormes réserves.

[09:14] In particular north of Siberia.
En particulier au nord de la Sibérie.

[09:17] I recommend to you a book by Jean-Michel Valantin entitled "Géopolitique d'une planète déréglée".
Je vous recommande un livre de Jean-Michel Valantin intitulé "Géopolitique d'une planète déréglée".

[09:22] He wrote absolutely fascinating pages
Il a écrit des pages absolument fascinantes

[09:24] pages about what is happening in the Siberian Far North.
des pages sur ce qui se passe dans le Grand Nord sibérien.

[09:27] With absolutely gigantic investments, particularly coming from China,
Avec des investissements absolument gigantesques, venant notamment de Chine,

[09:31] in order to develop immense oil platforms north of Russia.
afin de développer d'immenses plateformes pétrolières au nord de la Russie.

[09:40] Another example that seems striking to me showing that we are still living, in the end,
Un autre exemple qui me semble frappant montrant que nous vivons encore, au final,

[09:45] a development that fundamentally rests upon fossil,
un développement qui repose fondamentalement sur le fossile,

[09:49] is that last summer, in August 2017, an absolutely crucial event
c'est que l'été dernier, en août 2017, un événement absolument crucial

[09:56] in the history of globalization took place.
dans l'histoire de la mondialisation a eu lieu.

[09:58] It is the first time a commercial ship
C'est la première fois qu'un navire commercial

[10:02] passes through the Siberian north to reach Asia.
traverse le nord de la Sibérie pour atteindre l'Asie.

[10:08] From Europe to Asia without going thourgh the Suez Canal but going through the Far North.
D'Europe en Asie sans passer par le canal de Suez mais en passant par le Grand Nord.

[10:12] That is obviously tied to Global Warming
C'est évidemment lié au réchauffement climatique

[10:16] that this route is exploitable without an iceboat.
que cette route est exploitable sans brise-glace.

[10:19] This ship was called... Have you any idea how it was called ?
Ce navire s'appelait... Avez-vous une idée de comment il s'appelait ?

[10:23] - Santa Maria, no ? - No, the Christophe de Margerie
- Santa Maria, non ? - Non, le Christophe de Margerie

[10:26] Christophe de Margerie, former CEO of Total,
Christophe de Margerie, ancien PDG de Total,

[10:29] who died in a plane crash in Russia.
qui est mort dans un crash d'avion en Russie.

[10:32] Why ? Because it is a gas carrier.
Pourquoi ? Parce que c'est un méthanier.

[10:34] So a ship that conveys millions of cubic meters
Donc un navire qui transporte des millions de mètres cubes

[10:38] of liquid methane
de méthane liquide

[10:39] and which will allow the major economic development,
et qui permettra le développement économique majeur,

[10:44] in all likelihood, of the north of Russia.
vraisemblablement, du nord de la Russie.

[10:44] So, with these few examples
Donc, avec ces quelques exemples

[10:50] of recent energetic additions, in terms of fossil fuels,
d'ajouts énergétiques récents, en termes d'énergies fossiles,

[10:54] show particularly that, obviously, we are not out of fossils at all.
montrent particulièrement que, de toute évidence, nous ne sommes pas du tout sortis des énergies fossiles.

[10:58] That for, roughly thirty years, we are talking about climate change
Que depuis, environ trente ans, nous parlons de changement climatique

[11:02] and about energy transition, the global energy-mix,
et de transition énergétique, du mix énergétique mondial,

[11:05] roughly, we were at 88% of fossils in the 1980'.
environ, nous étions à 88% d'énergies fossiles dans les années 1980.

[11:09] We are at 87% now.
Nous sommes à 87% maintenant.

[11:09] That is to say it is perfectly stable.
C'est-à-dire que c'est parfaitement stable.

[11:12] And then secondly, what is important to keep in mind, is that in these climate change and energy transition issues, it should be noted that there is not one planet, there is not one single mankind, responsible and impacted as a whole by this climate change.
Et puis deuxièmement, ce qu'il est important de garder à l'esprit, c'est que dans ces questions de changement climatique et de transition énergétique, il faut noter qu'il n'y a pas une seule planète, il n'y a pas une seule humanité, responsable et impactée dans son ensemble par ce changement climatique.

[11:27] Instead we have profound inequalities, winners and losers.
Au lieu de cela, nous avons des inégalités profondes, des gagnants et des perdants.

[11:31] And Russia is obviously part of the winners of climate change.
Et la Russie fait évidemment partie des gagnants du changement climatique.

[11:34] Since this climate change will allow to bring out prodigious natural ressources which are additionaly only worsening the problem.
Puisque ce changement climatique permettra de faire ressortir des ressources naturelles prodigieuses qui, en plus, ne font qu'aggraver le problème.

[11:41] So, these examples, show well that we are still, in the end, fully into fossil fuels.
Donc, ces exemples montrent bien que nous sommes encore, au final, pleinement dans les énergies fossiles.

[11:46] Most importantly, we cannot expect that the oil spike gets us out of trouble.
Plus important encore, nous ne pouvons pas nous attendre à ce que la flambée des prix du pétrole nous sorte d'affaire.

[11:51] That is to say, there is a discourse, that often comes from degrowthers which is to say that anyway we are going to reach natural limits.
C'est-à-dire qu'il y a un discours, qui vient souvent des décroissants, qui dit que de toute façon nous allons atteindre des limites naturelles.

[12:00] We don't have enough oil to carry on the economic development as we know it.
Nous n'avons pas assez de pétrole pour poursuivre le développement économique tel que nous le connaissons.

[12:05] It is most likely true long term, but medium term which is the one that interests for issues of climate change, that is false.
C'est très probablement vrai à long terme, mais à moyen terme, qui est celui qui intéresse pour les questions de changement climatique, c'est faux.

[12:11] We realize there is still a lot of junk to burn.
Nous réalisons qu'il reste encore beaucoup de déchets à brûler.

[12:13] And we have absolutely considerable reserves of oil still under our feet.
Et nous avons absolument des réserves considérables de pétrole encore sous nos pieds.

[12:20] A figure, maybe... Yes?
Un chiffre, peut-être... Oui ?

[12:22] I was wondering if there were anyway examples when there was a major energetic shift and if there are maybe surprising examples...
Je me demandais s'il y avait des exemples où il y a eu un changement énergétique majeur et s'il y a peut-être des exemples surprenants...

[12:30] Yes, sure, I just end on this point.
Oui, bien sûr, je termine juste sur ce point.

[12:34] But roughly, to not get above the famous two degrees in 2100, it is necessary to let under our feet three quarters of proven reserves of oil, gas, and coal.
Mais grosso modo, pour ne pas dépasser les fameux deux degrés en 2100, il faut laisser sous nos pieds les trois quarts des réserves prouvées de pétrole, de gaz et de charbon.

[12:48] If you want, the fundamental problem is not a problem about having not enough energy, not enough fossil fuels and that will result in the spike.
Si vous voulez, le problème fondamental n'est pas un problème de manque d'énergie, de manque de combustibles fossiles qui entraînera la flambée.

[12:54] That really was the big fear of environmentalists in the 1970'.
C'était vraiment la grande peur des écologistes dans les années 1970.

[12:58] We realize that with the issue of climate change, in the end, the climate wall comes much earlier than the resource wall.
Nous réalisons qu'avec la question du changement climatique, au final, le mur climatique arrive beaucoup plus tôt que le mur des ressources.

[13:04] So that does not mean there never was an energy transition.
Donc cela ne veut pas dire qu'il n'y a jamais eu de transition énergétique.

[13:06] And indeed, Julien is right to underline the fact that there was, throughout history, brutal and sudden energy transitions.
Et en effet, Julien a raison de souligner le fait qu'il y a eu, tout au long de l'histoire, des transitions énergétiques brutales et soudaines.

[13:14] But unfortunately this is not nice to see.
Mais malheureusement, ce n'est pas agréable à voir.

[13:17] If we want to take concrete examples, moments of big decrease of CO2 emissions are moments of major economic crises.
Si nous voulons prendre des exemples concrets, les moments de forte baisse des émissions de CO2 sont des moments de crises économiques majeures.

[13:24] The Great Depression, is a period when, globally, CO2 emissions decrease steeply.
La Grande Dépression est une période où, mondialement, les émissions de CO2 diminuent fortement.

[13:30] The second World War, for the losing countries, for example Germany in 1945 has a magnificent energy transition, but well...
La Seconde Guerre mondiale, pour les pays perdants, par exemple l'Allemagne en 1945 connaît une magnifique transition énergétique, mais bon...

[13:37] We have two more recent examples which are more interesting.
Nous avons deux exemples plus récents qui sont plus intéressants.

[13:42] These are the cases of Cuba and North Korea.
Ce sont les cas de Cuba et de la Corée du Nord.

[13:46] Two really different countries.
Deux pays vraiment différents.

[13:48] Under communist regimes, but really different anyway.
Sous des régimes communistes, mais vraiment différents de toute façon.

[13:51] Which are confronted to the same issue, namely, in 1992, they are denied cheap oil that USSR was providing them to assure their geopolitical influence.
Qui sont confrontés au même problème, à savoir qu'en 1992, on leur refuse le pétrole bon marché que l'URSS leur fournissait pour assurer leur influence géopolitique.

[14:03] And these two countries are making very distinct choices.
Et ces deux pays font des choix très distincts.

[14:06] The most dramatic case is the one of North Korea, since it had an agriculture very intensive in inputs, in fertilizers and in pesticides that are very energy-hungry.
Le cas le plus dramatique est celui de la Corée du Nord, car elle avait une agriculture très intensive en intrants, en engrais et en pesticides qui sont très gourmands en énergie.

[14:16] And then the North Korean government made the choice to supply its military industrial complex with power.
Et puis le gouvernement nord-coréen a fait le choix d'alimenter son complexe militaro-industriel en électricité.

[14:22] That led to a disaster, well, a huge food shortage.
Cela a conduit à une catastrophe, enfin, une énorme pénurie alimentaire.

[14:25] We do not know exactly how many people died but estimates are around 5% and 10% of the North Korean population that passed away in about ten years.
Nous ne savons pas exactement combien de personnes sont mortes, mais les estimations sont d'environ 5 % à 10 % de la population nord-coréenne qui est décédée en une dizaine d'années.

[14:32] So really, a big demographic catastrophe.
Donc vraiment, une grande catastrophe démographique.

[14:35] The other example is a bit more reassuring but not that much.
L'autre exemple est un peu plus rassurant, mais pas tant que ça.

[14:39] It is the example of Cuba.
C'est l'exemple de Cuba.

[14:41] Cuba then, same issue, they profited from a cheap oil coming from USSR and in 1992, they came in what we call "El Periodo especial", the special period.
Cuba alors, même problème, ils ont profité d'un pétrole bon marché venant de l'URSS et en 1992, ils sont entrés dans ce que nous appelons "El Periodo especial", la période spéciale.

[14:54] A period of profound economical crisis, of true suffering also for Cubans.
Une période de crise économique profonde, de véritable souffrance aussi pour les Cubains.

[15:00] We estimate that Cubans, as a result of this major economic change, of being deprived of cheap oil, or anyway of having much less oil, lost an average of 5kg per individual.
Nous estimons que les Cubains, à la suite de ce changement économique majeur, d'être privés de pétrole bon marché, ou de toute façon d'avoir beaucoup moins de pétrole, ont perdu en moyenne 5 kg par individu.

[15:13] So it can be seen through the body of Cubans.
On peut donc le voir à travers le corps des Cubains.

[15:15] CO2 emissions haved decreased, if I reckon well, of 60%.
Les émissions de CO2 ont diminué, si je me souviens bien, de 60 %.

[15:18] So that is not bad, but it is less than we need to.
Ce n'est donc pas mal, mais c'est moins que ce dont nous avons besoin.

[15:22] We, to not exceed the 2 degrees in 2100,
Pour ne pas dépasser les 2 degrés en 2100,

[15:25] we should cut 80% of our CO2 emissions.
nous devrions réduire nos émissions de CO2 de 80 %.

[15:27] In wealthy countries and in France in particular.
Dans les pays riches et en France en particulier.

[15:29] So it is really something massive we need to do.
C'est donc vraiment quelque chose de massif que nous devons faire.

[15:31] So in Cuba, they did less, still they lost a lot a weight.
Ainsi, à Cuba, ils en ont fait moins, ils ont quand même perdu beaucoup de poids.

[15:35] These was a positive aspect, it is that cardiovascular diseases have sharply decreased.
L'aspect positif était que les maladies cardiovasculaires ont fortement diminué.

[15:38] Many epidemiologist are studying the Cuba case.
De nombreux épidémiologistes étudient le cas de Cuba.

[15:41] to see what an energy transition is concretely doing
pour voir ce que fait concrètement une transition énergétique

[15:43] in terms of public health.
en termes de santé publique.

[15:44] Because Cubains have walked a lot more, used bike...
Parce que les Cubains ont beaucoup plus marché, utilisé le vélo...

[15:47] Well, they had to profoundly transform their economy.
Eh bien, ils ont dû transformer profondément leur économie.

[15:50] Si this special period, ended when
Si cette période spéciale s'est terminée quand

[15:52] Cuba got support from Venezuela
Cuba a obtenu le soutien du Venezuela

[15:55] and cheap oil, badly refined by the way,
et du pétrole bon marché, mal raffiné d'ailleurs,

[15:58] Which led to a series of environmental issues.
Ce qui a entraîné une série de problèmes environnementaux.

[16:01] Let's say that they went out of this special period
Disons qu'ils sont sortis de cette période spéciale

[16:06] at the beginning of the 2000'.
au début des années 2000.

[16:08] So, truely we should be careful about this concept of energy transition.
Donc, vraiment, nous devrions être prudents quant à ce concept de transition énergétique.

[16:11] It is a bit the meaning of this introduction.
C'est un peu le sens de cette introduction.

[16:13] That is to say, this really unanimist concept,
C'est-à-dire ce concept vraiment unanimiste,

[16:16] I mean, who's against a ecological transition?
Je veux dire, qui est contre une transition écologique ?

[16:19] The ministry as of now is called "Ministry for the Ecological and Inclusive Transition".
Le ministère s'appelle désormais « Ministère de la Transition Écologique et Inclusive ».

[16:22] Everybody agrees, it is very, very kind.
Tout le monde est d'accord, c'est très, très gentil.

[16:23] There is a naive viewpoint to this.
Il y a un point de vue naïf à cela.

[16:25] But we need to concretely see what means a true energy transition.
Mais il faut voir concrètement ce que signifie une vraie transition énergétique.

[16:29] We need to see that what we hope for...
Il faut voir que ce que l'on espère...

[16:32] Actually never happened.
N'est en fait jamais arrivé.

[16:35] We cannot refer to an example from the past and say:
On ne peut pas se référer à un exemple du passé et dire :

[16:37] There, we should do it that way.
Là, il faudrait faire comme ça.

[16:39] And that is something very, very profound.
Et ça, c'est quelque chose de très, très profond.

[16:43] So why should we be careful with this phrase of energy transition?
Alors pourquoi faut-il faire attention à cette phrase de transition énergétique ?

[16:46] This point is a little more specific.
Ce point est un peu plus spécifique.

[16:49] We need to see where it comes from.
Il faut voir d'où ça vient.

[16:51] As a historian, I like to know where do concepts that hang around come from, that move around and then suddenly win the support of the many.
En tant qu'historien, j'aime savoir d'où viennent les concepts qui traînent, qui circulent et qui soudain gagnent l'adhésion du plus grand nombre.

[17:00] The first occurences of the phrase "transition energétique" are in English: "energy transition".
Les premières occurrences de la phrase « transition énergétique » sont en anglais : « energy transition ».

[17:06] It is in English, in the 1970', in 1973 precisely.
C'est en anglais, dans les années 70, en 1973 précisément.

[17:09] And what is interesting is to see that it replaces another phrase.
Et ce qui est intéressant, c'est de voir qu'elle remplace une autre phrase.

[17:12] A phrase that is much more problematic and which was that of "energy crisis".
Une phrase beaucoup plus problématique qui était celle de « crise énergétique ».

[17:18] Or "energy gap".
Ou « energy gap ».

[17:21] These two phrases were used a lot after 1972, 1973, following the oil shock.
Ces deux expressions ont beaucoup été utilisées après 1972, 1973, suite au choc pétrolier.

[17:26] And then there was the realization that the US had passed their conventionnal oil spike.
Et puis il y a eu la prise de conscience que les États-Unis avaient dépassé leur pic de pétrole conventionnel.

[17:31] We need to get back to these years 1973-1974, under the presidency of Jimmy Carter, at a time when there was a real fear linked to the energy supply of the US.
Il faut revenir sur ces années 1973-1974, sous la présidence de Jimmy Carter, à une époque où il y avait une vraie peur liée à l'approvisionnement énergétique des États-Unis.

[17:42] Jimmy Carter, the US president, made several speeches to the nation.
Jimmy Carter, le président américain, a fait plusieurs discours à la nation.

[17:47] You know, these big, solemnel speeches at the White House.
Vous savez, ces grands discours solennels à la Maison Blanche.

[17:50] On the theme of energy transition.
Sur le thème de la transition énergétique.

[17:52] If I reckon well, we have a very famous speech which is called "The malaise speech".
Si je me souviens bien, on a un discours très célèbre qui s'appelle "Le discours sur le malaise".

[17:57] A ultra-depressing speech.
Un discours ultra-déprimant.

[17:58] Really surprising to see that the american president does such a mood-killer speech.
Vraiment surprenant de voir que le président américain fasse un tel discours casse-ambiance.

[18:05] I think it is in 1973, when he explains that we cannot continue this way.
Je crois que c'est en 1973, où il explique qu'on ne peut pas continuer comme ça.

[18:09] That the american identity has completely been perverted by consumerism.
Que l'identité américaine a été complètement pervertie par le consumérisme.

[18:13] That now, Americans are defined by what they own and not by what they are and the christian values of puritan work, etc.
Que maintenant, les Américains se définissent par ce qu'ils possèdent et non par ce qu'ils sont et les valeurs chrétiennes du travail puritain, etc.

[18:20] So a really guild-inducing speech towards American.
Donc un discours vraiment culpabilisant envers l'Américain.

[18:24] He explains that Americans will most likely need to give up on individual cars, take the bus again and the collective transportation.
Il explique que les Américains devront très probablement renoncer aux voitures individuelles, reprendre le bus et les transports en commun.

[18:29] So, a very pessimistic speech on the economical future.
Donc, un discours très pessimiste sur l'avenir économique.

[18:33] We are really in an atmosphere almost... apocalyptic would be too strong but anyway quite depressed, let's say, in the US.
Nous sommes vraiment dans une atmosphère presque... apocalyptique serait trop fort mais en tout cas assez déprimée, disons, aux États-Unis.

[18:41] This discourse about energy transition first comes against this anxiety, this fear, this really really strong mental distress which is link to the energy shortage.
Ce discours sur la transition énergétique vient d'abord contrer cette anxiété, cette peur, cette détresse mentale vraiment très forte qui est liée à la pénurie d'énergie.

[18:51] The energy transition discourse is to say: we got solutions.
Le discours sur la transition énergétique est de dire : nous avons des solutions.

[18:55] Don't worry, there are technological solutions, economical solutions, we are going to handle it.
Ne vous inquiétez pas, il existe des solutions technologiques, des solutions économiques, nous allons nous en charger.

[19:00] It is in order to make this issue manageable and turn this problem of energy crisis, which is an existencial problem for developped enconomies, in a simple management problem of economic development.
Il s'agit de rendre ce problème gérable et de transformer ce problème de crise énergétique, qui est un problème existentiel pour les économies développées, en un simple problème de gestion du développement économique.

[19:13] What is interresting to see, is that in the beginning, energy transition, in the first texts, which comes from the US energy administration by the way, from a three-sided commission, organization that regroups
Ce qui est intéressant de voir, c'est qu'au début, la transition énergétique, dans les premiers textes, qui vient d'ailleurs de l'administration américaine de l'énergie, d'une commission tripartite, organisation qui regroupe

[19:24] Western Europe, the USA and Japan.
L'Europe occidentale, les États-Unis et le Japon.

[19:27] Sweden's Minister of the Future, which is very good at prospecting in the long run.
Le ministre suédois de l'Avenir, qui est très doué pour prospecter sur le long terme.

[19:32] And so, these institutions are everything but environmental.
Et donc, ces institutions sont tout sauf environnementales.

[19:34] These are rather the spearheads of the developped and industrialized West who are looking to manage Earth ressources.
Ce sont plutôt les fers de lance de l'Occident développé et industrialisé qui cherchent à gérer les ressources de la Terre.

[19:41] These institutions explain that energy transition is first nuclear power.
Ces institutions expliquent que la transition énergétique passe d'abord par le nucléaire.

[19:47] Basically it is, really, to make big investments in the nuclear energy.
En gros, il s'agit vraiment de faire de gros investissements dans l'énergie nucléaire.

[19:50] At this point, there are reports, the european commission that explains that energy transition in Europe is all about doing a shift toward nuclear energy that will allow to give back a energy sovereignty to the European community.
À ce stade, il y a des rapports, la commission européenne qui explique que la transition énergétique en Europe consiste à opérer un virage vers l'énergie nucléaire qui permettra de redonner une souveraineté énergétique à la communauté européenne.

[20:04] It is oil and fraction gas already and even worse, the transformation of coal into oil.
Il s'agit déjà de pétrole et de gaz de fractionnement, et pire encore, de la transformation du charbon en pétrole.

[20:12] So coal liquefaction is without the shadow of a doubt the most dreadful technology in terms of CO2 emissions we can think of.
Ainsi, la liquéfaction du charbon est sans l'ombre d'un doute la technologie la plus redoutable en termes d'émissions de CO2 à laquelle on puisse penser.

[20:18] It consists in taking coal and turning it with a lot of energy coming from coal into liquid fuel.
Elle consiste à prendre du charbon et à le transformer, avec beaucoup d'énergie provenant du charbon, en carburant liquide.

[20:22] It is a technology
C'est une technologie

[20:26] which had been develop by nazi Germany
qui avait été développé par l'Allemagne nazie

[20:28] because it was affraid of being cut from oil supplies.
parce qu'elle craignait d'être coupée de ses approvisionnements en pétrole.

[20:32] So this was an autarcik technology of war
C'était donc une technologie de guerre autarcique

[20:35] which could make sense in this context.
qui pouvait avoir du sens dans ce contexte.

[20:39] But which obviously has no sens in the 1970'
Mais qui n'a évidemment aucun sens dans les années 1970

[20:41] in Western Europe or the US.
en Europe occidentale ou aux États-Unis.

[20:44] So here is what energy transition is.
Voici donc ce qu'est la transition énergétique.

[20:45] By the bye, the fact that it is nuclear power,
Soit dit en passant, le fait qu'il s'agisse de l'énergie nucléaire,

[20:49] I have no evidence of it but it is that "energy transition"
je n'en ai aucune preuve, mais c'est que "transition énergétique"

[20:51] means something in nuclear physics.
a une signification en physique nucléaire.

[20:52] It is an electron going from a state to another around an atom.
C'est un électron passant d'un état à un autre autour d'un atome.

[20:54] I cannot tell much more about this.
Je ne peux pas en dire beaucoup plus à ce sujet.

[20:56] But this is firstly a nuclear physics term.
Mais c'est d'abord un terme de physique nucléaire.

[20:58] So, it is not impossible at all that nuclear-friendly atom engineers that coined,
Donc, il n'est pas du tout impossible que des ingénieurs atomiques pro-nucléaires aient inventé,

[21:04] in the end, in the common discourse and in our way of thinking
au final, dans le discours commun et dans notre façon de penser

[21:09] this term of "energy transition". Which is once more
ce terme de "transition énergétique". Ce qui est une fois de plus

[21:12] very problematic since historically
très problématique car historiquement

[21:13] it doesn't refer to anything.
cela ne fait référence à rien.

[21:13] So, does it mean
Alors, cela signifie-t-il

[21:16] that the story I wanted to tell you is absolutely
que l'histoire que je voulais vous raconter est absolument

[21:18] depressing and that there is no hope?
dépressionnaire et qu'il n'y a aucun espoir ?

[21:21] This might be the final moral, I don't know.
Ce pourrait être la morale finale, je ne sais pas.

[21:25] I am not sure of myself, on the moral of this history of energy.
Je ne suis pas sûr de moi, quant à la morale de cette histoire de l'énergie.

[21:30] There is one aspect which seems important to me regardless.

[21:32] It is to remind how history was not written in advance.

[21:36] This history of energy addition that you have here, was not given in advance.

[21:41] To me, it was not obvious that it would be the technological fate of humanity, and we have many clues.

[21:49] I have the first argument, which is probably the most important,

[21:52] it is that there were other possible technological ways.

[21:56] There were technological alternatives.

[21:58] In particular, there is a long past of renewable energies.

[22:02] Historiens tend to tell a story

[22:05] of industrial revolution that has been made upon coal.

[22:07] And that is a very problematic history.

[22:09] More and more historians are realizing

[22:11] that far into the 19th century and even at the beginning of the 20th century,

[22:14] renewable energies are first. It is the main energy source.

[22:19] I am going to give some examples beginning by quite

[22:22] anecdotal things but that are interresting I think.

[22:25] We could telle that the second half of the 19th century,

[22:29] that we commonly call the Second Industrial Revolution,

[22:32] was partly founded upon the pedal.

[22:35] Muscular energy is put to the use of extraordinarily efficient

[22:40] and extremely innovative technological systems

[22:43] The first example is the sewing machine.

[22:45] The sewing machine, in particular Singer but this is not

[22:48] the only company, seems to be a real technological revolution

[22:53] during the second half of the 19th century.

[22:55] There are many social utopias around this sewing machine.

[22:58] It allows to decentralize production

[23:00] since we are, in the end, independant from energy circuits.

[23:03] It is a technologically advance machine.

[23:06] This is a innovative firm, Singer at the end of the 19th century

[23:10] and at the begining of the 20th century, it is more than 60 000 workers

[23:13] who fabricate sewing machines in 4 or 5 factories around the worlds.

[23:16] And this is a force of 300 000 sales representatives.

[23:20] So it is first the creation of a market.

[23:23] A marketing strengh really powerful,

[23:25] it is one of the biggest multinational companies at the end of the 19th century.

[23:29] And if I put you the Singer building that was build in 1906,

[23:33] if I reckon well.

[23:34] Anyway, in 1906 it is the tallest building in the world,

[23:37] the tallest office place of the world, I mean,

[23:39] the Eiffel Tower was taller,

[23:40] But in any case, in Manhattan, the tallest tower.

[23:44] It is to show you that at the end, on the pedal

[23:46] and muscular energy, big industrial empires

[23:49] are forming at the end of the 19th century.

[23:51] The other example is even better know it is obviously the bike.

[23:54] The bike at the end of the 19th century is a mean of transportation ultra generalized.

[23:58] In France, there are more than 10 milion bikes

[24:00] at the end of the 19th and at the beginning of the 20th century.

[24:03] The bike is a cutting-edge techology at the end of the 19th century.

[24:07] Ball-bearing for instance... This is something historian barely studied.

[24:11] What I am telling you about is, to tell the truth, in no precise book.

[24:14] There is nothing really precise about this, but we know for example

[24:17] that ball-bearing systems have most likely been invented

[24:19] by a French engineer, whose name was Suriray, in 1860.

[24:22] We know that this was a bicycle manufacturer that was totally unknown in Paris.

[24:25] And yet, ball-bearing, if you want, is crucial to many industrial processes

[24:30] which go from weaponry, electrical engines, etc.

[24:33] But all of this is created in link to bicycle.

[24:36] The manufacture d'armes of Saint-Étienne,

[24:38] which is obviously a weapon factory, will re-use many technologies

[24:42] coming from the army to improve ball-bearing,

[24:45] chains, etc. but at the end make a modern bicycle.

[24:49] These are really cutting-edge technologies. Ultra-vital technologies which employ

[24:53] hundreds of thousands workers in France.

[24:55] France is one of the top bike manufacturing powers.

[24:57] England and France are the two bike world powers at the end of the 19th century

[25:02] These are really cutting-edge technologies

[25:04] that rest upon muscular force.

[25:05] So i find this important because it breaks the natural teleology which would be to say, we go from muscular power,

[25:10] we think of our ancesters who slaved away like animals,

[25:14] to the marvelous world of fossil fuels.

[25:17] No, that is not at all the story.

[25:18] At the end of the 19th century there really was big systems and technologies that were based upon muscular force.

[25:23] Another example that may be even more noteworthy is water power.

[25:29] In the US, at the end of the 19th century,

[25:32] 75% of industrial energy sti... comes from water.

[25:36] I would be wrong to say "still" because it could have continued this way.

[25:38] There was a huge hydraulic potential

[25:41] that could have grown.

[25:43] Indeed, hydraulic energy at the end of the 19th century

[25:45] has nothing to do with mills in our technological imagination.

[25:51] These are tools which used the last knowledge of hydrodynamics.

[25:56] So an important point is that the sewing machine, the bike

[25:59] and hydraulics were all resting upon fossil fuels.

[26:02] Because to produce steel in these proportion,

[26:05] to produce bikes in an efficient way,

[26:08] which will then be made of aluminum, etc.

[26:10] we need fossil fuel and coal.

[26:13] That is a major point, it is not one or the other.

[26:15] There is a way to use fossils which is much

[26:17] smarter than burning gas to run cars in circles.

[26:21] That is the most important point.

[26:24] Hydraulics then, a Swedish historian, who worked on hydraulics

[26:32] and the steam machine in England, made a really interesting study.

[26:36] He is called Adreas Malm, he made an interesting study about

[26:38] the shift, well this is not really a shift, I am exagerating,

[26:41] but anyway of the growth of fossil fuels,

[26:45] so of the steam engine which activate weaving looms

[26:47] in Lancashire - around Manchester - in England.

[26:51] Curiously enough, the power drawn from steam

[26:58] costs much more, at constant kilojoules

[27:01] than water mills, than hydraulics in the 1830'.

[27:05] and yet, it is at this time that english manufacturers of textile,

[27:08] of cotton in particular, are thinking: we will use the steam engines.

[27:12] What he explains very well, is that there was a potential

[27:14] growth for hydraulics that was really huge.

[27:16] We could still build dams. We could still produce a lot a energy

[27:19] with mills in England in the 1830'.

[27:24] He also explains that mills necessitate a form

[27:30] of social coordination between entrepreneurs.

[27:34] Because it was necessary to invest together in dams.

[27:36] It was necessary to produce on the river sides, which led to a series of concerns.

[27:39] Because if you want to produce on the river sides, you need to be in the countryside. So you have to take the workers to the countryside,

[27:45] give them a stay, build schools,

[27:49] build industrial colonies. It means that if these workers get on strike, basically, you are stuck

[27:56] since you cannot replace them easily.

[27:58] now the 1830' are a time, in England, of really high social turmoil. It is the "Chartist" movement

[28:02] which ask for the extension of the Charter.

[28:05] That is to say universal suffrage.

[28:11] That makes that english industrials, in the end,

[28:16] what the want by using the steam engine, is not saving money, it is two things.

[28:21] Firstly, not having to coordinate with collegues

[28:24] which are also competitors, because if you use

[28:29] hydraulic energy, for instance, you have to agree on when do you open the sluice gates.

[28:32] If you need more energy

[28:34] will you have the right for more water to urn your mills?

[28:36] There are a lot of concerns which need common organisation.

[28:40] And what they want first is getting out of energy commons.

[28:42] Getting out of this use of energy which rests upon a common organisation,

[28:47] an agreement, a larger economic coordination.

[28:51] So that, they really want an individualistic solution to energy issues.

[28:54] And the steam engine is this, this allows to produce when we want,

[28:57] at the pace we want, according to the exchange rates, according to the demand, etc.

[28:59] It linearizes time. They are really the masters of the energy rhythm.

[29:05] Whereas when you produce with hydraulic force,

[29:07] you need to accomodate when there are droughts...

[29:09] Well this also put the issues about time controling

[29:13] which are extremely important for the English economic world of 1830.

[29:17] The second vital function of the steam engine,

[29:21] is that it allows to produce anywhere, but in particular

[29:23] to produce in town where there are vast human agglomerations

[29:27] and a mass proletariat thar we can pay less.

[29:31] And if finally your workers get on strike,

[29:33] It is not a problem you can find other people to replace them

[29:36] more easily that if you had to bring them to the countryside.

[29:38] So the point is important, because it means that the use of steam

[29:41] in 1830 does not obey to any technologocal or economic rationality.

[29:45] It is more expensive and extremely polluting because the 1830' have terrible yields.

[29:49] We are going to talk in more detail about it

[29:51] It is dangerous because steam engines furthermore have a tendancy to blow up regularly.

[29:55] Steam furnaces are still lousy in these years.

[29:58] There is a huge risk of explosion.

[30:01] In spite of everything, English industrials are taking the leap in the 1830'.

[30:06] Because they are part of a certain economic and ideological framework

[30:10] which is, in the end, the free market, competition, productivism as well.

[30:15] Knowing that the English industrial and economic growth in these years

[30:21] rests strongly upon textile exports.

[30:23] England has a really special asset.

[30:25] It is that it exports a lot of textile products in this period, compared to other countries.

[30:30] It is also linked to a form of globalization.

[30:32] So this, this is an example I find interresting

[30:33] because it shows that energy choices

[30:36] do not necessarily meet a form of rationality.

[30:38] We inherited many choices which are rather irrationnal.

[30:41] Which will allow me to discuss other aspects.

[30:44] Wind power, another form of energy, that we can think as old fashioned

[30:49] in the 19th century, but not at all.

[30:52] Wind, particularly in the US, at the end of the 19th century, is considerable.

[30:58] In he 1890', this is more than 6 million wind turbines

[31:01] that are industrially produced with the best knowledge

[31:04] of air dynamics, by a few firms in the US.

[31:11] And these are 6 million wind turbines that, in the Midwest,

[31:13] allow the cultivation of these vast plains

[31:15] which will become one of the centers of cereal production in the world.

[31:20] So one of the biggest transformation of the farming industry

[31:25] at the end of the 19th century is based on wind power.

[31:30] And the last example I wanted to give you.

[31:33] it the the example of solar power.

[31:38] So, in the history of solar power...

[31:42] An important moment is doubtlessly in the US between the 1930' and the 1950'

[31:46] I will explain why.

[31:48] In the 1930', some architechts

[31:50] of whom George Fred Keck are deeply studying

[31:53] studying the technologies of the passive house.

[31:57] Basically, it is at this moment that a company

[32:00] called Thermopane is patenting double glazing.

[32:03] And so are defined the principles of a passive house, really energy efficient.

[32:07] At the beginning it is rather an elitist technology.

[32:10] It is adressing rich Americans

[32:12] who want to get out of urban networks, of electricity, etc.

[32:16] to go build pretty houses in the countryside.

[32:18] But, interresting fact, is that during the second world war,

[32:22] because the US government want to save up on oil

[32:25] and send it at maximum to the front,

[32:27] there are big investments which are done in the development

[32:30] of the solar house, in particular at the MIT.

[32:32] Where they are developping a solar house with a physicist

[32:35] called Maria Telkes.

[32:37] At the end of World War 2, the solar house

[32:39] seems edge cutting.

[32:41] It is something that we need to make real.

[32:42] There is a whole discourse about: we are going to make solar houses in the US.

[32:45] Because the end of World War 2 for the US,

[32:49] It is a big moment of malthusian worrying on resources.

[32:52] It is a bit like the Club of Rome report in the 1970'

[32:55] twenty years before, american are thinking:

[32:57] we sacrificed our resources on the altar of freedom.

[33:01] We consumed a lot of oil, minerals, etc.

[33:03] to produce a war industry and to free Western Europe

[33:07] and by so doing we do not have anymore ressources.

[33:08] Which is false indeed, Americans still have

[33:10] tons of minerals and even oil and coal.

[33:12] Anyway there is this discourse which is really strong in the public sphere.

[33:16] Truman is setting the "Fairdeal" comission which studies

[33:20] the oil spike and these issues

[33:21] about the lack of resources in the 1950'. So the solar house is part of this

[33:26] instant: the malthusian worrying. There are many physicists

[33:30] of the Manhattan project who say: let's leave nuclear power

[33:33] because it is too complicated, very dangerous,

[33:36] that might be expensive, we don't have that much

[33:38] uranium, etc. And they say that future is all about

[33:40] solar power and the solar house.

[33:42] And despite all that, the solar house is going to decline.

[33:47] Even though there was a booming market.

[33:49] In the 1950' it is 80% of houses, in Florida, in California,

[33:54] evidently the States the more exposed to sunlight, which use solar water heaters.

[33:57] It is not necessarily ultra-high-tech stuff.

[33:59] There was the MIT house which was very high-tech.

[34:01] But the majority of solar technologies are basic ones.

[34:03] These are pipes painted black which run on a well exposed roof.

[34:07] It allows to have hot water to shower oneselves

[34:09] These are not complicated things.

[34:12] And what is interresting to see is that this whole sector,

[34:15] at least this technological trajectory which was extremely promising

[34:17] is finally going to collapse.

[34:20] In the 1950'... It is partly... Obviously it would be a bit ridiculous

[34:26] to say it is only this man's fault. But this is a man

[34:28] called William Levitt who is an american real estate developer

[34:34] who in the 50' explains that he has the means to solve

[34:38] the housing crisis which was nagging in the US.

[34:40] One should know that in the 50', obviously, it is a time

[34:42] of huge economic growth in Western Europe and in the US:

[34:45] the GI are coming back and then demographic boom.

[34:49] So there was a house shortage, and this dear Mr Levitt explains

[34:53] that what we should do, is applying the good old taylorian

[34:55] methods of rationalization of manufacturing into the housing sector.

[34:58] Finally, he thinks

[34:59] that this is absurd to see that we did so great at building

[35:02] cars in mass, and that we can do the same

[35:04] for housing: it is to say, simplify tasks.

[35:06] The problem is that in order to proceed, we should also simplify

[35:08] the building very deeply and make rabbit hutches very badly insulated.

[35:14] The result, is that every architectural effort

[35:19] to make energy-efficient houses are abandoned.

[35:23] And we produce houses that are impossible to live in during summer

[35:26] because ill-insulated, lousy.

[35:28] So as soon as the 50', we put air conditionners en masse

[35:33] in these American house estates.

[35:37] The problem is that once you have air conditionners,

[35:39] it creates an energy demand spike during summer.

[35:43] Eletricians hate that because it compels them to oversize

[35:46] production capacities to meet the spike and in the end,

[35:48] there is a lot of capital unused outside of these spike periods.

[35:53] So electricians, which are General Electric

[35:55] and Insull mainly, are going to plead for electric heating.

[36:00] So, Electric heating,

[36:02] in a country such as the US, well gifted with gas, oil,

[36:05] coal and wood aswell, it really is an aberration.

[36:07] Because you know, it is a really poor energy yield.

[36:11] You turn heat energy into electricity,

[36:13] that you then turn back into heat energy with losses all along the line.

[36:16] So it is really a bad energy choice.

[36:18] This is a really interresting example.

[36:19] We can see that there was, seemingly, another possible trajectory

[36:23] toward more energy efficient housing,

[36:25] even solar, even autonomous.

[36:28] And because of the interrest of some real estate developers,

[36:32] combined with the individual interests of electricians,

[36:36] we come to this aberration, which is the fully-electric

[36:39] suburb house of the US in the 50' and 60',

[36:41] extraordinarily energy-consuming with a whole rethoric

[36:44] adding to the energy consumption.

[36:46] Americans in those years, if they only had the air conditoner

[36:51] they had the right to stick a little bronze insigna onto their house.

[36:54] If they had the air conditioner and heater, this was a silver insigna

[36:57] and if the whole house was fully electric, and often by the way suburb

[37:00] house, at this time,

[37:02] electricians were realizing that it was when they

[37:05] bought the house, that they absolutely needed to equip everything

[37:08] electric, the oven, the fridge, etc. Then you got the gold insigna.

[37:12] So, there was a really strong propaganda

[37:14] for energy consumption. There were some slides of

[37:19] these houses build en masse in these 50' - 60'.

[37:24] One last example which seems really important to me, is the case of the car.

[37:30] The individual car is, whitout a doubt, the technological choice

[37:34] which really created this shift toward fossile

[37:38] relying economies, toward the anthropocene

[37:41] to use the now established term.

[37:43] This is an etremely energy-consuming technology,

[37:45] very harmful in regards to the environment.

[37:47] That mostly began in the US, there really is

[37:50] an american distinctive characteristic of choosing the car.

[37:53] From the end of the 20', it is not far from half of american households

[37:56] who are equiped with cars, this famous Ford T,

[37:59] while in Western Europe, even in the rich coutries

[38:02] sush as England, it is not at all the case.

[38:04] We are far from this penetration rate.

[38:06] We need to wait the 60' to have equivalent penetration rates.

[38:09] And a weird thing is that the car

[38:12] which was often assimilated to a love of freedom,

[38:15] there really would be a kind of attraction for cars,

[38:19] an individualist solution that allows to move fast etc.

[38:23] Actually, when we look the beginning of cars

[38:25] there was no natural evidence.

[38:29] And no evidence that the car would grow

[38:31] so fast in the US, for several reasons.

[38:35] First, the car at the begining is a nuisance

[38:40] for a large majority of the population

[38:43] and a luxury for a few rich people.

[38:48] And this pose a bunch of problems in terms of:

[38:51] who belongs the road and the street in town,

[38:55] there are many complaints, resistances, petitions

[38:58] against the individual car because we feel that

[39:02] it really is an appropriation by the snoby rich of the urban area.

[39:05] For example, children plays aren't possible anymore

[39:07] in the street due to cars.

[39:09] In the 1900', if you consider the big american cities,

[39:12] it is a carnage, hundreds

[39:13] of children are being crush over every year.

[39:15] In the 1920', there is an entire movement

[39:18] against car violence that sets in place

[39:21] with huge protests.

[39:22] More than 10 000 children demonstrate in New York in 1922.

[39:26] Monuments are erected to the dead

[39:28] children crushed under the car wheels.

[39:30] There is a strong fight against cars.

[39:34] In France, it is the same, we don't have precise studies

[39:36] but a journalist called Pierre Thiesset

[39:38] made a good job at compiling every article

[39:41] against the car in France in those years.

[39:46] Most of the newspapers find unthinkable

[39:51] the idea to give the streets to cars.

[39:57] I remember an article from The Economist in 1911

[39:59] that explains we cannot tolerate something that smells so bad,

[40:01] that makes so much dust in London streets, it is unbearable.

[40:04] Yet The Economist isn't a technophobic newspaper, against development or anything.

[40:09] So, we don't have surveys about cars but we got Switzerland

[40:12] And Switzerland is very interresting because

[40:15] they have a tradition of popular initiatives.

[40:20] and the canton of the Grisons

[40:21] which is a german speaking canton in the east, in the 1900',

[40:27] forbids car usage. They say: it ruins roads,

[40:33] so costs a lot to repair and to

[40:35] maintain, it pollutes, it is dangerous,

[40:39] and it is undue competion towards the railroad.

[40:45] In Switzerland, the railroad is property of the State.

[40:47] So, we will need to raise more money for the pleasure

[40:50] of a few Swiss rich in terms of repairing the roads

[40:54] and subsides to the railroad company.

[40:59] Ten times, the Swiss auto-club lobby group

[41:05] will try to bring down this law

[41:07] through popular initiatives,

[41:08] and will get kicked everytime.

[41:11] So between 1900 and 1928, ten times, the Swiss said:

[41:14] we don't want to allow individual car traffic on the canton roads.

[41:20] So, this isn't a technophobic argument

[41:21] because, again, these are essentially economic argument and there is also the pollution.

[41:25] But for instance they allow trucks of course.

[41:27] Because trucks have a manifest utility to carry heavy loads.

[41:30] This is more efficient that what we had before.

[41:33] They allow ambulances, fire trucks...

[41:35] It is the idea that we can choose the use of technologies.

[41:39] But, deeply I think that the example of Switzerland

[41:41] shows well enough that if we had been living in a truely

[41:44] democratic society, where democracy had been extanded to technological choices,

[41:48] it is not clear that the car would have got the story we know.

[41:52] Furthermore, to take back the case of the US,

[41:56] in the US, roads were not good quality roads,

[42:00] ill-kept, otfen not or not much tarmacked.

[42:04] and in the US, there was an extanded network

[42:06] of tramway: the electric tramway.

[42:09] In the US in 1900, there are 35 000km of electric tramway lines.

[42:14] It represents 5 billion travels a year for 100 million inhabitants,

[42:18] to give the size of tramway usage.

[42:22] So, it was a technology not totally green

[42:25] because it was electricity made with coal

[42:27] but anyway much greener that individual cars.

[42:31] What is interresting is seeing that

[42:33] the car replaced the tramway because, here we can talk

[42:36] of a transition.To find cars in the US today, you better get up early.

[42:39] There are still some in a few cities but it is rare.

[42:41] There are some in San Fransisco, Portland, but globally

[42:44] there aren't many tramways in the US.

[42:46] The story of the tragedy, because we can see this

[42:50] as a tragedy, happens in several instalments.

[42:54] First, the car is linked to the development

[42:57] of suburbia, basically.

[43:00] and the suburbs are perceived, in the conservative elite minds

[43:04] of the time, in the 1920' Herbert Hoover

[43:07] is the US president,

[43:08] as the best way to fight communism.

[43:12] The goal is to turn Americans

[43:15] into individual house owners.

[43:17] Because, Herbert Hoover says:

[43:19] when we have our own house,

[43:21] we have other political affects than when we live

[43:24] in ethnically and socially diverse cities.

[43:27] So there is an encouragement toward suburbanisation

[43:30] which is linked to a much broader political project

[43:35] which is to block socialism and communism in the US.

[43:41] and the car fits in this context.

[43:44] Because the car is developping a lot, especially with Ford.

[43:50] At this time, this booming of cars in the US,

[43:55] takes place because of consumer credit.

[43:59] before the car, the consumer credit wasn't really a thing.

[44:03] Or it was really informal

[44:06] in let's say, dubious places.

[44:09] Those who could afford it were the rich

[44:12] to buy a house of business men to buy appliances.

[44:16] but globally, you could not borrow in order to consume.

[44:19] And the big car companies,

[44:21] Ford and General Motors, are going to become big credit suppliers

[44:26] and the stake is to set in place a form of social control. Because once you have bought

[44:33] your car on credit, and that you have weekly

[44:36] loan payments, you need to earn a sum of money each month,

[44:41] each week with your job.

[44:43] And doing this, the american companies

[44:47] succeeded to solve a fundamental problem they had

[44:51] which was factory turnover.

[44:55] Before the Great Crash of 1929, a period full of employment,

[44:58] american workers were in a strong position.

[45:02] Particularly workers of the car industry.

[45:05] They had high wages and labour historian showed well that in the world of

[45:12] qualified workers a culture of the sufficient. These high wages,

[45:15] in opposition to the neoclassical economic theory,

[45:18] didn't spur workers to work more and earn more.

[45:21] It spurred to work less, because ouce you had enough money to pay for your needs

[45:25] and those of your family, you stopped working.

[45:28] That means that higly paid workers had an unfortunate tendency

[45:31] to absenteism, to not come to work on moday morning, etc.

[45:36] Or changing job when the employer or the foreman was a bit annoying.

[45:40] And to Ford, it was a real issue.

[45:42] You know, Ford introduced the conveyor belt production techniques

[45:45] and he had a hard time finding workers to fullfil the job,

[45:48] because it was a mind numbing work.

[45:51] There was a figure where, roughly, he needed to find

[45:53] nine workers to get a single one long term.

[45:57] There wasa really big turnover problem.

[45:59] So, if you want, cars,

[46:02] The setting up of consumer credits tightly

[46:04] linked to the car, it is a wonderful mean

[46:06] of social control through consumerism.

[46:13] The other moment of truce

[46:16] which makes us leave this public transportation system...

[46:19] It is less crucial,

[46:21] but it is an interresting law because

[46:22] it is an antitrust law. We could think these kind of law are good. Think about Google, Amazon, Facebook

[46:27] and co, the well-known GAFA. We should break the trusts,

[46:30] but here it had a desastrous

[46:31] consequence because in 1935, there was a law

[46:35] titled the Wheeeler Rayburn Act which dismantles

[46:38] the big electric trusts. So General Electric and Insull

[46:41] have to sell their tramway company.

[46:43] And, tramway companies may as well make sense

[46:45] in a vast indutrial conglomerate, to smooth

[46:48] the power demand spikes i told you about.

[46:51] But, taken individually, each of these tramway

[46:52] companies was at a deficit.

[46:54] Which means that they will be bought up for nothing

[46:57] by General Motors, Firestone and Standard Oil.

[47:01] And you can guess, by Sloan,

[47:03] Who is CEO for General Motors and is also

[47:06] the shadow man of this story.

[47:09] You can imagine that for these companies,

[47:11] for tire, car, and oil industries.

[47:14] The heart of their business model

[47:16] was not to create collective electric transportation

[47:19] and they will work on sabotaging the tramway system

[47:22] and replace it with fuel buses, to not maintening the lines

[47:25] or simply to close them

[47:27] to increase their car market.

[47:31] So I think it is an interesting example

[47:33] because it is paralel to the case

[47:36] of the solar house and the transition to an all-electric system.

[47:40] We see well that technological world we get

[47:42] today, is not a world that respond to a form of optimization.

[47:45] Because i sincerely think that the car

[47:47] was not at all the optimal choice.

[47:49] Texts from the 1910', making think about Ivan Illitch

[47:52] or André Gorz before their time, said that the individual car

[47:55] is going to slow down, in the end, motion.

[47:57] We will arrive in a sub-optimal situation because

[48:00] congestions are an obvious problem, right away.

[48:03] And because it is a big CO2 emitter, very energy demanding.

[48:09] Which is build because of real interests,

[48:13] Those are not general interrests

[48:15] but industrial and economical ones, that are very particular.

[48:19] – Just maybe...Would that mean...

[48:22] I don't know – if you have question don't hesitate.

[48:24] But does this mean that these transition period...

[48:28] of not transition but addition of energies

[48:30] are also moments of socio-economical struggle, for profound friction

[48:35] and that we forget this fact too often in this story?

[48:40] - Yes, that is a very important point.

[48:42] Si you take the big technologies of the anthropocene,

[48:46] the ones that emitt a lot of CO2,

[48:47] that consume the most energy

[48:49] because they deeply transform the environment

[48:51] and the ways of life, they are not made

[48:53] in a form of growth or rather of belief for progress.

[48:59] This is not at all how it happened.

[49:01] We could imagine hat the 19th century was simply progressist

[49:03] and that at the 20th, we were still fascinated by machines

[49:06] and that this is only recently that we worry about the environment

[49:09] and that we question the technological trajectory.

[49:11] This is a entirely wrong vision.

[49:13] I already told you about cars, big scandal and for all that,

[49:17] that happened, with takeovers, lobbying...

[49:22] Well there is a fascinating book by Norton who tells

[49:25] how the car conquered the road in the US.

[49:27] It was really violent.

[49:29] We are going to learn to the pedestrians how to cross the street,

[49:32] we will explain that the road does not belong to them

[49:34] that it belongs to the car first.

[49:35] We will punish, for example jaywalking,

[49:37] to wross the road where you should not, etc.

[49:39] We will teach the kids to respect the red lights, etc.

[49:42] You can imagine the whole setting of this discipline

[49:45] so that cars car run peacefully in town.

[49:48] This, indeed, is done despite the complaints, the struggles.

[49:51] The fun fact is that shopkeepers are totally

[49:53] against the car at the beginning. Whereas now,

[49:54] as soon as we put a car-free street, shopkeepers complaint

[49:57] but at the beginning of the 20th century it was the contrary.

[50:01] We close a quay to traffic and it is a undescribable tragedy.

[50:04] You don't imagine... prevent the entire city to pedestrians.

[50:08] It is quite what the car meant in the 1920'.

[50:11] So these are ultra-important moments of struggle

[50:16] And an example that seems fundamentally important to me,

[50:18] and that we need to keep in mind,

[50:19] is an quite recent historical asset and not well-known.

[50:23] It is that environment is ultra-important at the end of the 18th

[50:29] and start of the 19th century, when the industrial revolution happens.

[50:31] Environment, at this time, is first a medical concept.

[50:36] Environment is the best concept that physicians have to

[50:40] understand epidemics.

[50:41] How is that everybody is going to get ill

[50:42] at the same time in this room?

[50:44] This is not because somebody will have given us a microbe,

[50:46] that we would have give one another.

[50:47] No, it is because something has changed in the environment.

[50:50] In the air quality, in the water quality,

[50:51] in what physicians call the surroundings.

[50:54] They were using a latin term: "circumfusa",

[50:56] all things that surround us

[50:57] and that determine our health. And even further,

[51:00] a population's health, its number,

[51:02] and even the shapes of the bodies.

[51:04] Because we are still in a transformist way of thinking.

[51:10] Think Jean-Baptiste de Lamarck who explains that we transmit the

[51:12] characters we aquire to our posterity, so,

[51:15] there is this idea that environment deeply transforms bodies,

[51:18] and that we transmit these transformations to our posterity.

[51:21] An environment alteration

[51:24] really has tragic consequences

[51:26] in the minds of 18th century people.

[51:29] Two examples. In 1732, there is a man

[51:32] called George Cheyne, an English doctor

[51:34] who writes a book intitled "The English malady".

[51:37] This this English malady is coal.

[51:39] He explains that every constinuant, every caracteristics

[51:43] of British health are altered kilometers around

[51:47] London. Because in London, we burn

[51:49] a lot of coal to warm up and that produces

[51:52] a health disaster. Another striking example,

[51:55] is a Rouennais physician, who criticize

[51:59] Paris police, saying...

[52:03] I should first explain that what we call police,

[52:06] at the end of the 18th century, has little to do

[52:11] with police nowadays.

[52:13] The police at the end of the 18th century, is an urban institution.

[52:15] It deals with anything linked with

[52:18] the city, in particular the environment.

[52:21] And in police treaties of the end of the 18th century,

[52:23] we find a lot of references to the population health,

[52:26] to air quality inspired by a greek physician

[52:29] called Hippocrate, who studied the link

[52:34] between environment and health.

[52:36] The Rouennais physician explains that the Paris police

[52:39] had not done a good job,

[52:40] and Paris has become the most ill, the most twisted,

[52:43] the most hunchbacked and ugly people on Earth

[52:45] because the Paris police poorly handled the environment

[52:48] and by so doing produced this degeneration

[52:50] of the population. So environment

[52:51] is ultra-important. Anyway, the coal and chemical

[52:56] industries developped. We mass produced, with extremely

[53:00] polluting methods,

[53:02] despite this strong environmental consciousness and worry.

[53:07] This provoked a lot of struggles.

[53:09] I worked a lot on chemical plants at the beginning of the 19th century.

[53:14] For each plant, you have hundreds of petitions,

[53:17] often signed by doctors who explain,

[53:20] that if you, prefect,

[53:22] allow this plant, you are going to produce degenaration

[53:24] in this borough's population. And that is really something

[53:27] massive. It is a crucial point...

[53:30] This is not some sort of consciousness reserved to the elite.

[53:32] No, this is an general thing.

[53:35] This is crucial because we tend to think about

[53:37] the resistances against technologies as something

[53:41] elitist and rather

[53:42] marginal. It would be in the romantic circles

[53:44] of the 19th century, the anarchists circles that

[53:46] we would have think that we should

[53:49] break machines, etc. No, because this shift toward

[53:52] fossil fuels had already been subject to protean

[53:56] resistances and the bourgeoisie was very

[53:59] divided on the matter.

[54:02] Because there was, on the one hand, the industrial bourgoisie

[54:04] who wanted to produce more efficiently,

[54:06] sometime using fossil fuels

[54:08] or by producing disgusting chemical reactions.

[54:11] And then, there was the urban up-middle class, who owned buildings

[54:15] in big cities such as Paris,

[54:17] who had absolutely no desire to have a stinking factory

[54:20] just next to it.

[54:21] So, necessarily, that creates a lot of struggles.

[54:24] This is an important point.

[54:26] - I am often the devil's advocate but we only

[54:29] have left ten minutes or so, maybe we could slide

[54:33] toward the questions about transition that bring us back to today.

[54:39] About what represents the energy transition today?

[54:42] What about these questions of technological transition, of Green Techs?

[54:47] What does it implies and what does...

[54:50] - Indeed, this is the moment when the historian

[54:52] is the least competent.

[54:53] But what I am trying to show you is that

[54:56] doing a real energy transition is not all about

[55:00] putting some wind mills or solar panels

[55:02] to answer a constant demand in energy.

[55:06] That these energy needs, this technological world

[55:10] that we heritate from, really needs to be

[55:14] called into question.

[55:16] It finally means doing an inventory about

[55:17] a series of choices that have been made in the past.

[55:20] If i can, a last historical trip: the military

[55:24] is ultra-important in this case, in the history

[55:26] of energy.

[55:28] Why? Because the military, when the issue is to kill

[55:32] and not be killed, energy efficiency is not

[55:34] what matters the most.

[55:37] If you take a F-16, a Mirage or a Rafale,

[55:41] It consumes between 6000 and 8000 L of kerosene an hour.

[55:45] So it means as much as

[55:47] several years of a standard car.

[55:50] We are in some sorts of energetic exuberance

[55:52] which are proper to the military.

[55:54] The problem is that army, given that it is

[55:58] at the cutting-edge of technological systems, then

[56:00] these military technologies spread to civil technologies.

[56:04] This is a classic, but I will simply give you

[56:06] two examples: first, the aviation.

[56:10] We cannot think about aviation as we know it today without

[56:13] the Second World War.

[56:15] It is during World War II that all the infrastructures that allow contemporary

[56:17] aviation to set in place.

[56:20] Aluminum, that we start to mass produce

[56:22] on the American continent, is linked

[56:24] to World War II. The production

[56:26] of plane fuel, which is a really specific thing

[56:28] are considerable reseach projects

[56:30] of the same order as the Manhattan Project,

[56:33] for the atomic bomb during World War II.

[56:35] So aviation, really, is the daughter of World War II.

[56:39] Up to the point in 1944 when the US,

[56:42] who know well that they are in advance

[56:43] on all these technologies, are setting this system,

[56:47] a treaty in Chicago, who installs

[56:49] the International Civil Aviation Organization

[56:51] which prevent taxation of these fuels.

[56:53] And nowadays, we still live with this regime.

[56:56] So, starting to talk about energy transition, is starting to talk about this.

[56:59] Seriously talking about aviation as we know it.

[57:02] Aviation as we know it is not compatible with climate goals.

[57:05] It is a sector that increase really much in terms of CO2 emissions.

[57:08] I believe it double every ten years, at least, it goes really fast.

[57:11] And this is something we can't really replace,

[57:14] we cannot make planes fly with

[57:15] electricity, with the actual technologies.

[57:17] The second example I find interresting are the highways.

[57:21] The Highways, indeed, have a certain role

[57:25] in the waste of energy.

[57:28] It is first a military technology.

[57:30] The first to build highways are Italiens and Germans

[57:33] before World War II.

[57:35] For nazi Germany, the goal is to solve

[57:37] the strategic dilema of being vulnerable

[57:39] to a coordonate attack on both fronts, the East front and the West front.

[57:42] Building highways had to allow the Wehrmacht

[57:45] to go across really fast, to invade Poland and then

[57:47] coming back fast to avoid being invaded by the French and the English.

[57:50] It had a highly strategical function.

[57:53] Eisenhower, who was the chief of allied forces, came back marveled

[57:58] from Germany by these highways, which are clearly

[58:01] better than US roads.

[58:04] And under his mandate, is voted what is one of the biggest civil ingeneering

[58:09] projects of the 20th century: the Interstate Highways Defense Act.

[58:15] So the link between highways and the military, are that the highways

[58:18] had to allow the decentralization of the whole american industrial production.

[58:24] The goal was to make the economy resilient

[58:26] against a Russian nuclear warfare.

[58:28] Roughly, the Americans had realized that the Germans

[58:30] had really succeeded to continue to purvey their factory of

[58:33] ball-bearing, of sulfur acid,

[58:35] anything needed to sustain a war economy.

[58:40] German tanks were working, were repaired, etc.

[58:42] despite the massive and constant bombing of the RAF and of the US Air Force.

[58:47] And how did they manage to do this, is because they

[58:49] had scattered the industry across the whole german country.

[58:51] The goal of the highways is to do the same thing

[58:53] at the level of an entire continent, the United States.

[58:56] And so, if we want to talk about energy transition,

[58:58] we need to talk about the form of cities.

[59:02] One example, these days we talk about electric cars,

[59:06] and even worse, of self-driving electric cars

[59:09] So, an electric car, if you take the Tesla

[59:12] The weight of the battery is of 540kg, now, the Tesla

[59:16] is particularly monstruous, because it is a very powerful car, etc. Anyway it weighs a lot and so,

[59:20] honestly, the best solution already,

[59:21] is to make very light cars, which don't go so fast,

[59:24] I would say, 70 or 80 km per hour maximum,

[59:27] They should be lightened a lot, share a carpool...

[59:29] There are a thousand other smart solutions before doing electric cars,

[59:33] which are very demanding in rare metals,

[59:36] rare earth metal is not about rarity, it is mostly about that their extraction pollutes a lot.

[59:39] So there is an argument, which would be:

[59:41] transition is impossible because we don't have the ressources...

[59:45] We have no idea, given the size of Earth's mantle

[59:47] I feel that it is not going to be an issue, but rather...

[59:48] Where will we accept to produce these rare earth metals which are gross to produce?

[59:52] For now, it is going to be in Baotou, a chinese city,

[59:55] particularly, where they extract a lot of these metals.

[59:58] Any green tech

[01:00:00] relying on many materials are an issue.

[01:00:04] Typically, the wrong kind of answer

[01:00:07] we bring up front. The electric car is

[01:00:11] the best example, the worst, indeed, being the self-driving cars.

[01:00:13] Autonomous cars will produce a big

[01:00:18] rebound effect.

[01:00:20] There is a recent article in Science which showed,

[01:00:22] that is a simple thing, they suggested simply

[01:00:26] a free driver given to several segments of the population.

[01:00:29] At the moment you have a free driver who can

[01:00:31] drive you anywhere by day or night, the kilometers skyrocket.

[01:00:35] Because you say: here, I am going to the restaurant

[01:00:36] at full night but no problem, I am carried.

[01:00:38] And for instance, the older people do many more kilometers

[01:00:41] starting at the moment they don't have to drive anymore.

[01:00:44] So, indeed, the autonomous car is going to be a source

[01:00:46] of kilometric growth absolutely gigantic,

[01:00:52] As well as the electric car probably.

[01:00:54] Here, in my opinion, if we want to reason

[01:00:56] in serious terms on this issue about energy transition,

[01:01:00] We need to stop talking in terms of primary energy production.

[01:01:03] Because here, we can't get out, if our energy consumtion

[01:01:06] is constant, the mass of rare earth in order to produce

[01:01:11] wind mills and solar panels is absolutely nonsensical.

[01:01:14] I don't know if it is achieveable, but anyway it is surely

[01:01:16] really polluting.

[01:01:18] And do we want to put ourselves in a chain of very strong

[01:01:21] dependancy toward China who is

[01:01:23] for now the only massive producer of rare earth.

[01:01:27] There is a really good book by Guillaume Pitron,

[01:01:29] who is not particularly environment friendly,

[01:01:31] but he explains that there is a national sovereignty problem.

[01:01:33] China, while it accepts doing the most disgusting stuff on its land,

[01:01:37] this production of rare earth conquers bit by bit the chain of value.

[01:01:40] I mean, finally, gets the most of added value

[01:01:43] by producing magnets, batteries, etc.

[01:01:45] And the European industrials who whould be strong, for instance,

[01:01:48] to create high-end oil engines etc.

[01:01:51] are bad at building electrical engines.

[01:01:53] They are going to be reduced at being sheet metal benders.

[01:01:55] So, in fact, we are going to enter a form

[01:01:57] of technological degrowth in some countries.

[01:02:00] Which is also a problem, outside of any environmental issue.

[01:02:02] It economical terms, it is a real problem, for jobs, etc.

[01:02:05] It is not obvious at all that the energy transition will be purveyor of jobs

[01:02:09] It is a kind of myth as well, environment friendly,

[01:02:12] to say that we are going to report in the end...

[01:02:15] That we are going to produce less energy with

[01:02:17] machines and put people to work and by so doing creating jobs.

[01:02:19] But to me this is an illusion as well.

[01:02:22] The productivity of a machine is such that is you reduce the number of machine

[01:02:27] or the suppplying in machines, in fact you reduce to jobs.

[01:02:29] Because in fact, humans are not competitive compared to machines.

[01:02:33] So there, there are many fundamental problems, to my mind, that...

[01:02:36] That we need to confront if we want to start talking seriously

[01:02:40] of energy transition.

[01:02:42] - So, maybe some questions, if you want?

[01:02:47] - Yes i would like to thank you for your exposé which was passionating.

[01:02:50] I wanted to go back to the begining, because I'm a little disturbed.

[01:02:53] Because there is one other...There is one specialist

[01:02:55] of energy called Jean-Marc Jancovici

[01:02:58] and who talks about energy spikes, either oil, or gas, all that,

[01:03:02] and who explains that, indeed, there is oil

[01:03:04] and all that but that it would seem that one century ago

[01:03:07] we used 10 oil barrels to get 100.

[01:03:10] Today we need 10 barrels to get 20 or 30

[01:03:14] and that if this ratio gets to 10 for 15, it stops.

[01:03:17] So even if oil is here, we won't have energy anymore to get it...

[01:03:21] What is your position toward this?

[01:03:22] - I think that as long as it will be profitable to get it, we will, even if the costs are huge.

[01:03:26] I mean, schist oil or gas, energetically it is not terrific.

[01:03:30] Now, there was a recent article in Le Monde,

[01:03:32] where we saw that in Texas, it shot up.

[01:03:33] Simply because there was money to make.

[01:03:34] So we will go on to extract schist oil and gas,

[01:03:37] Even if it costs more and more energy wise.

[01:03:39] As long as it is financially profitable, we will do it.

[01:03:41] Even if in terms of energetician it does not make any sense,

[01:03:44] or that it does less and less sense, I think that the economic world

[01:03:47] does not work like this.

[01:03:48] The issue is in reality that, this oil spike issue,

[01:03:51] well, I already said it, but we've been talking about it for a long time.

[01:03:53] and every time we realize that there is still junk to burn.

[01:03:55] For example, there was articles about methan hydrates

[01:03:58] that are found in the ocean, these are tons and tons

[01:04:00] of coal we could still burn.

[01:04:02] I don't know, I am not an geologist expert of these questions.

[01:04:05] But I feel that focusing on the spike, we might forget

[01:04:09] about the first wall which is climate. Furthermore, this issue of the spike

[01:04:14] and of the collapse linked to the spike passage,

[01:04:15] is even so a riches' ecology.

[01:04:17] Because it is us, the rich countries, who are confronted

[01:04:19] to this energy scarcity issue.

[01:04:21] The least developped countries do not consume much energy.

[01:04:24] So, at a push, it is not really their concern.

[01:04:26] Though, the thing that is really unfair with climate change,

[01:04:29] is that this is the rich countries that took advantage of it,

[01:04:30] emitting CO2, and the tropical countries,

[01:04:33] rather poor, will be affected very strongly

[01:04:36] by the question of climate change.

[01:04:39] So, focusing a bit too much on the spike issue,

[01:04:42] we might get lost in the weeds, that is to say

[01:04:44] of global warming, which is the first and most urgent thing to solve.

[01:04:46] - We often hear about..., precisely of owners of...

[01:04:51] who develop carbon energies. Who buy a lot of patents

[01:04:54] to burry them and go on exploiting carbon energies.

[01:05:01] - I am not sure I get it here.

[01:05:03] - Patents which would not use carbon energies,

[01:05:05] - Patent that were bought in order to...

[01:05:08] - To stop technologies by buying the patent.

[01:05:12] - I have not seen that in what I have read but why not, I don't know.

[01:05:14] - Ok, by the way, the Japanese made a car

[01:05:18] with magnets, each wheel, is a bunch of magnets

[01:05:21] and each magnet has a lifespan of 250 years.

[01:05:25] And they make a Mitsubishi car run with magnets.

[01:05:28] - Well, I don't know at all this car. I never heard of...

[01:05:30] - I thikn it is more about politics and industrials

[01:05:32] that slow everything down.

[01:05:34] - I think that the question of the car, is its past, in fact.

[01:05:37] First off, it is really... you can get a car to run with anything

[01:05:39] you want but it has an absurd premise to move one ton of metal

[01:05:43] to move 80kg of flesh. So, I think fundamentally,

[01:05:47] the car, the problem is that we focus, there,

[01:05:49] on the new cars, the last gimmick that will allow to

[01:05:52] make a super car. And we don't talk anymore about collective

[01:05:53] transports, subway, bus, bike, Low Tech things that work well...

[01:05:58] - One does not prevent the other.

[01:06:00] - Or does it... This is

[01:06:01] an important point, we cannot develop everything.

[01:06:03] we cannot have everything, I think there is a time

[01:06:05] when rightfully, both economically and

[01:06:07] environmentally speaking, we cannot develop everything.

[01:06:11] And to live in innovative societies, that is a really important point,

[01:06:13] to me, what does it mean, I think we live in a very

[01:06:15] innovative society. It does not mean that we have

[01:06:16] to be technophobic, but that we need to choose.

[01:06:18] We need to chose certain technological pathways and not others.

[01:06:21] And so, we cannot develop everything.

[01:06:22] - But where is the fools' crutch...

[01:06:25] Well that, the title, sorry about that.

[01:06:26] It was, maybe, ill-appropriate, becase it is not that

[01:06:30] we should not make an energy transition

[01:06:31] but it is the way we talk about energy transition,

[01:06:33] we are going to do it, organize a big national debate.

[01:06:37] We are simply going to put offshore windmills and solar panels,

[01:06:42] it seems to me a bad way to set the issue.

[01:06:45] And for another reason, that i didn't approach yet.

[01:06:47] It is that, if we take the history of energy, what was crucial

[01:06:50] in that history is the change of uses.

[01:06:52] For instance, we start producing electricity to fuel

[01:06:56] the alcohol lamp, Edison's bulb if you wish.

[01:06:59] So, the same way, we extract oil, a bit to light ourselves

[01:07:02] but massively to move ourselves.

[01:07:03] It is because there are new uses,

[01:07:05] that we start use a lot of new primary energy sources,

[01:07:07] or at least increasing the extraction of primary materials.

[01:07:10] The important point is that we first need to think the consumption

[01:07:13] before thinking the production.

[01:07:15] We need to drasticly reduce the energy consumption.

[01:07:18] And then we may think about renewables behind this

[01:07:21] already lowered consumption.

[01:07:23] - I will try to link this with history.

[01:07:26] Actually, I have a question regarding this.

[01:07:28] I will not develop the reasonning behind the statement i make.

[01:07:31] Each will be free to think whatever he/she wants.

[01:07:33] One of the solutions, because we think about realistic solutions

[01:07:35] and it pleases me in your discourse, because we

[01:07:38] often talk of a myth through the transition

[01:07:40] that would consist in saying that thanks to technology,

[01:07:43] we will be able to keep our living confort as it is.

[01:07:46] That according to me, and to many others, it is a complete myth,

[01:07:50] today, well, it is a sweet dream.

[01:07:52] So, according to me and others, one of the only solutions

[01:07:55] to rightfully decrease consumption

[01:07:58] would be to go on a decrease of the GDP.

[01:08:01] To cut the countries' GDP in half.

[01:08:04] That is one of the few realistic solutions today,

[01:08:05] in order to link technology we have to the needs of

[01:08:10] degrowth that we have to try saving the

[01:08:11] demography, well, the people we have today

[01:08:15] on Earth. I wanted to know if, in this regard,

[01:08:17] if historically speaking, there already was,

[01:08:20] at a given moment,

[01:08:21] this idea to reduce general production.

[01:08:25] Because we have always been in an increase of the production.

[01:08:27] Was there a time when, historically,

[01:08:29] there was this hypothesis to say: we need to reduce

[01:08:33] this generalized production to a large scale to continue and go ahead?

[01:08:37] - So reduce, in the 1970', yes.

[01:08:40] Anyway, the idea of a stationnary economy,

[01:08:43] it is something rather old. John Stuart Mill, in the 1860',

[01:08:46] explained that we should stop the growth anyway,

[01:08:49] getting to a plateau in terms of ressources, social bonding, etc.

[01:08:54] There already was this idea that we needed to stop growing.

[01:08:56] So this was something that existed. Then, I don't know if it is realistic

[01:09:00] tu cut in half the GNP.

[01:09:02] I think that the GNP, we already discussed a lot about it but,

[01:09:05] we know it is something really flawed,

[01:09:07] that is bad to measuring well-being.

[01:09:10] If for example somebody invented from one day to another an engine

[01:09:12] which used, I don't know, something free,

[01:09:15] which would only use air to work, I don't know.

[01:09:18] It would reduce the GNP considerably because we wouldn't extract oil anymore.

[01:09:21] We could not tax it, etc. so it would fundamentally reduce the PNB.

[01:09:25] So, I think we need to get out of this debate, to my mind, of this

[01:09:27] growth/degrowth debate and think, once again,

[01:09:29] in terms of technologies and material infrastructures.

[01:09:33] But I agree, it is partially linked.

[01:09:35] We cannot imagine an infinite growth.

[01:09:36] - We are going to take one last question. Go ahead.

[01:09:38] - Yes, thanks. So, you have very well

[01:09:41] demonstrated, a bit earlier, that the development of the car civilization

[01:09:45] was, in a way, consubstantial with the

[01:09:47] urban sprawl and so with the grasp on the cultivable land,

[01:09:53] among other things. That so, we could not today,

[01:09:58] effectively with both these conditions, live withou having one, two,

[01:10:02] even three cars in certain situations.

[01:10:05] That is linked to the fact that we disconnected the place we live and

[01:10:11] the place we produce and work. Today, If you want,

[01:10:15] the amount of energy we consume for transportation,

[01:10:19] regarding the total, could be around 30% to 40%

[01:10:21] - Yes, that is it, roughly. - So, it means that one of the way,

[01:10:25] one the middle/long term to shift paradigm

[01:10:30] in our organisation of the land is to take back

[01:10:35] an organization that would allow the development of cities

[01:10:40] where, at the same time, we put back working places,

[01:10:47] resting places, commerces, public services

[01:10:52] and all this organization which makes that, indeed,

[01:10:58] people live in a context where they feel

[01:11:01] belonging to a life community.

[01:11:05] Ithink that what I say here, it is not saying

[01:11:09] that we will go on spending energy or

[01:11:13] adding energies progressively over time

[01:11:15] on the contrary, I say: let us think back the country planning so

[01:11:20] that the consumption of energy linked to commuting is reduced

[01:11:25] in sensible proportions, thanks.

[01:11:28] - Well, good, I have nothing to add. This is totally true.

[01:11:30] This is the way we should start asking the issue of

[01:11:32] energy transition, yes.

[01:11:33] - Well thank you a lot Jean-Baptiste.

[01:11:35] The talk, indeed, can go on in an informal

[01:11:37] way after, but we have to end the show.

[01:11:40] Thanks a lot.

[01:11:42] [Applause]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lO0r5O4-2wU

Summary

TL;DR — The common narrative of energy transition, where one energy source replaces another, is a historical fallacy. In reality, energy sources have been added cumulatively, with fossil fuels still dominating the global energy mix. True energy transition requires questioning our current energy needs and technological choices, not just adding renewables.

Key points

• The idea of a linear energy transition (e.g., wood to coal to oil) is inaccurate; historically, new energy sources have been added to existing ones, leading to increased overall energy consumption and cumulative emissions.

• Despite the rise of renewables, fossil fuels (coal and oil) still constitute the vast majority of the global energy mix, and their consumption has not significantly decreased.

• Historical technological choices, such as the widespread adoption of the automobile and suburbanization, were driven by socio-economic factors and industrial interests rather than pure technological or environmental rationality, leading to increased energy dependence.

• Past attempts at energy transitions, like Cuba's post-Soviet era, highlight the severe socio-economic disruptions and hardships that can accompany a sudden reduction in energy availability.

• The concept of

Résumé / Summary (fr)

En bref — Le récit courant de la transition énergétique, où une source d'énergie remplace une autre, est un fallacy historique. En réalité, les sources d'énergie ont été ajoutées cumulativement, les combustibles fossiles dominant toujours le mix énergétique mondial. Une véritable transition énergétique nécessite de remettre en question nos besoins énergétiques actuels et nos choix technologiques, pas seulement d'ajouter des renouvelables.

Points clés

• L'idée d'une transition énergétique linéaire (par exemple, bois vers charbon vers pétrole) est inexacte ; historiquement, de nouvelles sources d'énergie ont été ajoutées aux sources existantes, entraînant une augmentation de la consommation globale d'énergie et des émissions cumulées.

• Malgré l'essor des renouvelables, les combustibles fossiles (charbon et pétrole) constituent toujours la grande majorité du mix énergétique mondial, et leur consommation n'a pas significativement diminué.

• Les choix technologiques historiques, tels que l'adoption généralisée de l'automobile et l'étalement urbain, ont été motivés par des facteurs socio-économiques et des intérêts industriels plutôt que par une rationalité technologique ou environnementale pure, conduisant à une dépendance énergétique accrue.

• Les tentatives passées de transition énergétique, comme celle de Cuba après l'ère soviétique, soulignent les graves perturbations socio-économiques et les difficultés qui peuvent accompagner une réduction soudaine de la disponibilité énergétique.

• Le concept de « transition énergétique » est apparu dans les années 1970 pour gérer la peur de la pénurie d'énergie, initialement axé sur le nucléaire et d'autres technologies industrielles, plutôt que sur des préoccupations environnementales.

• Les choix technologiques, y compris ceux liés à l'énergie, sont souvent le résultat de luttes socio-économiques et d'intérêts industriels, et non d'une simple progression vers le progrès. Une véritable transition énergétique nécessite une remise en question fondamentale de nos modes de consommation et de nos infrastructures.

À retenir — La transition énergétique ne consiste pas simplement à remplacer une source d'énergie par une autre, mais à réévaluer fondamentalement nos besoins et nos choix technologiques passés pour construire un avenir durable.