Could I possibly ask the same for your estimate of timescale and resource requirements to totally rework the global energy infrastructure (while also reducing economic inequality taking into account the world, not just the US)?
You won't believe me but I will give it a shot.
I try not to take things on blind belief, but it would seem a little churlish merely to assert where a debate can exist using specific details/facts (of course in this there are unknowns where one must make assumptions).
1. assume global awareness of climate change as an existential threat, understood and addressed within 2-5 years.
I'd tend to agree with Neven - I'd be very surprised if it happened (without something so catastrophic that you can forget any question of a rational response as all efforts will be set to fighting the catastrophic event in question). The reason I think this is that it's been quite clear for some years now - arguably since 2003 (European heat wave), but you can choose any number of serious (and statistically climatically linked in many cases) events - and there just isn't that response to them. If there is a response is it weak and limited and in many cases (the US especially) easily pushed away by a single cool winter or suchlike.
Yes - there is movement - people are slowly starting to grasp that things are changing, the noises from politicians (but not yet their actual actions) are gradually changing. Right now though it just seems to me the rate of change is really very slow and widely disparate from what the scientists are saying (the climate continues to change considerably faster than public understanding of it).
However, you're calling it an assumption - which is fair enough, it isn't an assertion.
2. Utilize an industrial de-carbonization strategy, including the implementation of water conservation and sustainable (ish) agricultural methods, coupled with wide-scale food consumption pattern changes. The only possible modern analogy to this process is the U.S. world war II total resource mobilization effort, the expense of 3Xtotal GNP over the course of 5 years in additional spending and the implementation of household, community, regional and national sustainability metrics.
time to 85% reduction of all fossil fuels = 20 years
20 years to rebuild the world - perhaps doable theoretically. In practice though you have fierce opposition from the socioeconomic elites and profound indifference from the masses. Let's assume it was going to happen though - how do you think it would look?
Would the government turn around one day and say to their people - we are going to tear down all the old infrastructure and rebuild new infrastructure? Who would pay people to carry out this work? What would the implied cost of energy become, and how would you preserve the economy in relation to that? Where would the energy come from to do this work? (it's hard to see how you don't have a large initial rise in emissions even if enough fossil fuel energy is actually available by then given oil already reached peak).
What do you think sustainable agriculture would look like? How are you going to change food consumption patterns? By permitting only the most wealthy to eat as they please and using prices to force the cheapest junk you can on the rest? Or by rationing and legislatively enforcing limits on a population? (fairer but in direct opposition to the free market dogma of the modern age).
It seems to me you are requiring a totally unprecedented (and to me rather improbable) transformation in how people relate to the wider world. You are requiring a world where the population of the US starts to say they care - fundamentally care - about how the people in the nations they exploit for resources live. A world where people don't burn corn in car engines even as food prices reach levels capable of triggering civil wars in some nations.
As events become increasingly more catastrophic, sure - people will respond - but why do you think they will respond with greater concern for people other than themselves and their immediate catastrophe? How will greater personal hardship make them sacrifice more for the good of another person in another land (or the future), whom they will never know? While hurricane Sandy made a bit of a mess -do you think the people whose houses were destroyed were thinking how they need to change their ways for the greater good? Or more concerned with how they would replace their houses? Was there even the hint of a thought in the rest of the population that they really ought to start making changes so that there would be less people suffering events like Sandy? I mean - beyond perhaps fleeting lip service?
we can start at the beginning if you wish. simple show me how a single industry application, say the manufacture of batteries for electric vehicles and solar off-grid housing cannot possibly be a sustainable enterprise? This would be a good starting place.
Lithium ion battery technology? Lead acid? Or?
With most resources of course, they look more sustainable if you pick an item in isolation. For instance, if you are going to replace the worlds cars - you might require x million tonnes of iron ore (assuming a lot of recycling!). On the face of it that might seem OK - and that you can produce cars for thousands of years. Then however, you look at all the other ways that resource (iron) is used - ship building, construction, etc and the picture really starts to change.
If one takes lithium, it's a good case in point:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium#ProductionThere are differing opinions about the potential growth of lithium production. A 2008 study concluded that "realistically achievable lithium carbonate production will be sufficient for only a small fraction of future PHEV and EV global market requirements", that "demand from the portable electronics sector will absorb much of the planned production increases in the next decade", and that "mass production of lithium carbonate is not environmentally sound, it will cause irreparable ecological damage to ecosystems that should be protected and that LiIon propulsion is incompatible with the notion of the 'Green Car'".[46]
However, according to a 2011 study conducted at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the University of California Berkeley, the currently estimated reserve base of lithium should not be a limiting factor for large-scale battery production for electric vehicles, as the study estimated that on the order of 1 billion 40 kWh Li-based batteries could be built with current reserves.[80] Another 2011 study by researchers from the University of Michigan and Ford Motor Company found that there are sufficient lithium resources to support global demand until 2100, including the lithium required for the potential widespread use of hybrid electric, plug-in hybrid electric and battery electric vehicles. The study estimated global lithium reserves at 39 million tons, and total demand for lithium during the 90-year period analyzed at 12–20 million tons, depending on the scenarios regarding economic growth and recycling rates.
Even if you take the optimistic argument above - that you can make 1 billion batteries - enough to totally replace the current vehicle fleet - where will you find it for your solar power storage? Or other vehicles like agricultural equipment? Do you consider even the optimistic estimates above - 2100 - sustainable? There was once a time when there was oil and gas for over 100 years ... and copper, phosphate, etc. We might have lithium - but what about our grandchildren or their children? What will they do?
