How green is the energy revolution really?

most people realize that we are in deep we hear a lot about the urgent need to get off fossil fuels I will do everything in my power to win the Clean Energy Future so how are things going on this front we're at this incredible inflection point the Russian invasion of Ukraine has transformed the energy landscape in ways you might not expect somebody asked me what is a wind generator sound like and I said it sounds like money to me what's stopping the global energy Supply from going fully green show me this Frankenstein of a car

you got here and how fast is the world moving towards this [Music] goal it's 8 in the morning and the climate campaign group last generation is preparing for another protest these activists call themselves the last generation who can stop climate collapse German authorities like so many others around the world have declared policies to reach Net Zero by the middle of the century but these protesters are deeply frustrated by the pace of change away from fossil fuels to clean energy today their target is blocking one of NE B's busiest roads and the group manages to shut

it down for 45 minutes these kinds of tactics aren't popular with many but the protesters insist they will not be deterred we managed to bring our peaceful protest onto the road we will not get stopped by the police by higher repressions or anything else the group is part of a network of climate protesters using similar tactics to make their message stick they've glued themselves to robes thrown fake oil over a climp and mashed potato at a mono we need to get off fossil Resources by 2030 there's no negotiation we need to get off by then

not 2045 as our government proposes right now we waited way too long and this is a death sentence to society so as leaders respond to climate change is the world moving fast enough towards clean secure [Applause] energy climate activists say things have been made worse by the global energy crisis the Russian invasion of Ukraine presented a historic opportunity for green change but campaigners insist Europe failed to grasp it until Russia turned off the Taps it supplied Europe with more than 40% of its imported gas and about a quarter of its oil and yet to plug

this Gap governments across Europe turned back to fossil fuels to keep the lights on the government right now they are fueling the crisis by still sub subsidizing fossil fuels by extracting more oil more gas in January 2023 the German Village of lerat grabbed Global headlines with the mass occupation of a site where the government gave permission to expand a coal mine you are the change and you are the hope the fact green party ministers also backed the plant only fueled anger it really encapsulated some of the tensions that governments faced in reacting to Russia's Invasion

which was a desperate time and governments took desperate and controversial measures governments turned to fossil fuels in the immediate aftermath for a very simple reason which was that they were available for the fossil fuel companies it was boom time again you saw this big spike particularly in oil and gas prices extraordinary to see the levels uh that we're getting for that wholesale gas price another day another petrol price record oil prices in June of 2022 climbed above $120 a barrel and then in natural gas the rise was even more extreme so in August of 2022

prices were about 10 times as high as they had been in the Years leading up to the invasion even coal the dirtiest fossil fuel of all enjoyed profits many thought had long gone after it seemed to Peak in 2013 Global consumption in 2022 P 8 billion tons for the first time in history so does this mean the world will never find the will to shift to Green energy fast [Music] enough well not necessarily so you'd think hearing all of this that it has been a dire time for the energy transition in the immediate aftermath of

the invasion it seemed like the energy transition might slow down as governments turn to coal and natural gas but what we've seen instead is a real acceleration in investment in sources of green energy in 2022 globally installations of rooftop solar panels Rose by half with investment in solar and wind growing from 357 billion to 490 billion exceeding investment in oil and gas Wells for the first time and in 2023 it's predicted that total investment in clean energy will hit $1.8 trillion compared with 1 trillion for fossil fuels Vladimir Putin's energy threat to the West seems

to have backfired the war in Ukraine may have fast-tracked the global transition to Green energy by as much as 5 to 10 years by sending fossil fuel prices soaring Russia made Renewable Power look more appealing than ever oil and gas became really expensive and so other forms of energy look increasingly attractive particularly in the long term and then governments are really interested in energy security particularly domestic sources of clean energy uh because of this growing concern of overdependence on hostile government diversifying a way from Russia for fossil fuels and massive investment in renewable energy around

the world regions and governments have announced significant Investments and Partnerships the inflation reduction Act was the biggest step forward on climate ever ever creating new green manufacturing hubs and jobs in unlikely places one of the remarkable things about recent years in the energy transition is you see parts of the world that formerly were dedicated to fossil fuels becoming something entirely different and there's no place where the this is more evident than the North Sea because it's an absolutely enormous resource of wind and it's relatively shallow which makes it easier to put in big turbines in

England Hull has become a manufacturing site to help put these giant turbines together governments around the world want to create jobs and generate votes although new green policies are accelerating big new Investments it's not clear that politicians Promises of green jobs will bear fruit Ro at scale so what more needs to be done to get to Net Zero and is it being done for a start major bottlenecks in bureaucracy and infrastructure need to be eased to allow the new wave of Renewables to plug [Music] in it's a phenomenal construction project and invisible to most people

deep beneath the Streets of London that's exactly what Alice DEA Hunty is working on so we're about 30 M below the surface here and this train is transporting the spoil from what's come out of the tunnel Boring Machine she is overseeing a 1 billion pound project to rewire South London with a new 32 km underground tunnel so this is the forest air circulation down in the tunnel so so we have good air to breathe this makeover is essential if London's grid is going to cope with a surge in green energy Supply it's a huge project

7-year construction project deep under London basically to rewire it so to replace what were aged cables with bigger higher capacity cables so it's future proofing the city against electrification of Transport growing electrification need um quietly just going on under the roads of the city without people realizing but this is just one wire on a much bigger Global circuit board and as wind and solar Farms shoot up and fossil fuel power stations scale down long cues to connect to the grid are leaving green energy operators short fused to add to the challenge by 2050 the world

will need to generate much more electricity than it does today to hit climate goals including more than double to hit Net Zero now we're at this incredible inflection point where we have to completely reconfigure the grids to accommodate renewable energy and to make the clean energy [Music] transition more grid connections and less red tape could help speed up the global move to Green energy by 25% new ways are also needed to store the energy generated by Renewables and to share it connecting into other countries plays a really uh crucial role as well because that means

we can share our energy so when the wind is blowing here but there's more energy needed in Denmark we can send it that way and vice versa to do that more grids will need to be knitted together by cables known as interconnections they are incredible Feats of engineering um they are laying these high voltage direct current cables all the way through the sea and they land at either end in what are called converter stations which are almost sci-fi like pieces of equipment that turn that electricity back from direct current into alternating current which is uh

what we use in our homes buildings hospitals and businesses so they're a really key part of the energy transition Innovations like these could help roll out more renewable energy but as the sun doesn't always shine and the wind doesn't always blow the world will also need new sources of clean power the power of the atom or old ones greatest source of energy man has ever discovered nuclear power which went out of fashion decades ago is now hoping for a makeover in places like the Bristol Channel where Britain's first new nuclear power plant in 30 years

is taking shape 10,000 people are working around the clock to get Hinkley Point C ready to switch on in 2026 you can see we've got 52 cranes on site and Big Carl is the biggest crane in the world and Tam alawi is its commissioning director we're building this power station so that we are able to generate 7% of the UK's Power by 2027 nuclear power produces hardly any carbon emissions and unlike wind or solar can run 24/7 to give grids the consistent base load they need with the recent push for energy security across the globe

there are now fresh eyes on nuclear power the energy crisis and the war in Ukraine have had a real impact on the perception of nuclear power and it has highlighted The Importance of Being energy independent having the ability to build our own power stations will enable us to have that energy Independence nuclear power is much safer than energy produced by fossil fuels and even wind turbines but like many nuclear projects Hinkley is over budget and behind schedule nuclear's unpopularity High upfront costs and long build times mean that the technology has gone Rusty in Western countries

and that's challenging for the clean energy transformation having not built something for a long time we're having to develop and establish the capability in Britain that includes the supply chain and includes our people to be able to deal with all the challenges of construction of a massive Mega scale project like inly Point C part of that is leveraging some of the experience from other countries so in China for ex example they are building power stations more frequently if the world is to get off fossil fuels one thing needs to happen for sure the Alternatives can't

just do good for the planet they need to make good money too and there's one place where the tycoons have always known how to get the most bang for their [Music] buck in the Heart of Texas green jobs are booming the traditionally conservative state is leading the way for renewable energy across the nation the lanar state might not be the obvious place to find a boom in Green Tech but these days cattle generate $8 per acre here compared with hundreds from wind turbines somebody asked me what is a wind generator sound like and I said

it sounds like money to me Texas is a staunchly Republican state where many remain skeptical about climate change yet hard economics is transforming another big business traditionally linked to fossil fuels if we can bring the modern technology into these older vehicles it really lets you appreciate them and continue to use them into the future Kevin Emma's company is giving classic American Muscle Cars a new lease of Life by converting them to Electric technology although these converted classic cars form a niche end of the market he's hoping to capitalize on The Wider boom in electric vehicles

the process is disassemble the vehicle reassemble the vehicle with all the electrical components then spent a heck of a lot of time wiring it all up and and then lastly uh getting it dialed in and tuned which is what we're doing today 8.32 perfect they've been working on this replica 1965 Shelby Cobra for the last 6 months and now it's finally time for rubber to meet Road this is actually our first ecobra that we'll be testing it hitting the streets with the car has passed all of its tests and we're ready to rock and roll

EVS especially bespoke models like these are not in the budget for most ni however sales of EVS have been turbocharged by the benefits they offer in fuel costs and convenience all [Music] right it's very very convenient to charge your car at home and it's also very cost effective it's less than a third give or take on the cost to fill up a car with electricity than it is fill it up with gasoline the effect of that is is a much Greener solution but not everyone around here is happy to do away with petrol show me

this Frankenstein of a car you got here old attitudes die hard I grew up in the muscle car era in 65 to 68 in high school if you wanted a hot good-look chick you needed a hot good-look car it was just that simple continued growth in the EV Market is Central to a green future and here the numbers are encouraging by 2025 EVS will make up a quarter of new car sales globally putting a total of 77 million EVS on the road this figure is set to rise to over 700 million in 2040 when an

estimated 34 of new car sales will be electric to get there car makers around the world will invest $1.2 trillion by 2030 what's really interesting in recent years is the surge in money going to electrified transport which is now about as large as as the level of capit Capital going to wind and solar and so for a long time green cars electric cars were something that investors were excited about but hadn't really hit the mainstream and now that's changed but there are hazard signs ahead EVS need batteries and batteries need lithium the boom has thrown

up environmental concerns about lithium mining in places such as the atakama desert in Chile in the broader picture the world's transition to clean energy could stall without the crucial minerals required to boost the transformation to Green energy some environmentalists will probably have to change their perspective historically environmentalists have specialized in not building stuff so preventing companies from coming in and ruining for example a stretch of pristine Wilderness now the climate movement has to be about building stuff that includes building things in areas that historically an environmentalist might have wanted to protect like a desert it

includes big investments in mining which remain Emi of Industries but you need those uh resources in order to speed the transition towards green [Music] energy and this is just one of many changes required to power the world towards the promised land of fully green energy a journey that is still only just starting so you have seen this enormous surge of investment in America in Europe in China in India this is all promising it's also not at the scale required and it's late the world is already warming so this is both a hopeful story because there's

lots of action and a reminder that much more needs to be [Music] done hi I'm Charlotte Howard executive editor at The Economist if you'd like to read more about the energy transition please click on the link opposite and if you'd like to watch more of our now and next series please click on the other link thanks for watching and don't forget to subscribe