Energy Reality: What We’re For

The UK’s electricity was the cleanest ever in 2024, new Carbon Brief analysis shows, with carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions per unit falling by more than two-thirds in a decade.

In Power Metal, Beiser explains why we would need drastic increases in mining of critical metals – including copper, nickel, cobalt, lithium, and the so-called “rare earths” – if we were to run anything like the current global economy solely on renewable electricity.

The illusion that a transition to a service economy would lower our material footprint is caused by the inability to look at the system as a whole and the feedback loops that exist.