Can you imagine a family that decides to buy a Ferrari, a house in Cadaqués and a trip around the world without taking into account if they have the resources to finance them? It doesn't seem reasonable. The normal thing would be to optimize the level of consumption, but conditioned to the budgetary restriction of each family. This type of situation of optimization conditioned to the available resources are the usual problems both in economics and in many other fields such as engineering. However, the energy transition has been considered politically as a process of reducing emissions without restrictions. Scientists tell us what is the temperature increase limit that should not be exceeded and politicians set dates for decarbonization.
But the energy transition is a process of reducing emissions that has many restrictions and produces very significant indirect effects that must also be taken into account in its optimization. Climate models take into account the enormous complexity of the ecosystem, but energy transition models do not seem to take into account the complexity of the economic and social system. Forgetting that we are dealing with an optimization problem with restrictions in a system with complex interactions between its components produces a multitude of paradoxes and delays the achievement of the objectives.
First, there are multiple constraints on the emissions minimization problem: technological, political, economic, social, and geopolitical. Although it is obvious, it is necessary to remember that technology does not allow the immediate substitution, not even in the short term, of non-renewable energies. But, in addition, the administrative obstacles to start up photovoltaic and wind projects make their adoption even slower. The economic restrictions are not only related to the financing of investment in renewable energy.
It is also necessary that the price of energy in the transition does not skyrocket, as this increases the probability of social conflicts and the loss of competitiveness, with the consequent loss of employment, reducing popular support to continue with the essential reduction of emissions. In addition, a very high price of energy causes other countries to return to burning coal or oil, as is the case of India, moving away from the achievement of emissions targets, a global problem by nature. It should also be borne in mind that a different rate of taxation of emissions in different economic zones harms the competitiveness of the zones that impose a faster transition. And this is aggravated if import tariffs for objects produced with higher polluting emissions are not graduated. In the geopolitical restrictions, of which I spoke to you a few months ago, there is no need to insist.
Second, not taking into account the complexity of the economic and social system produces enormous paradoxes and hypocrisies. One. Germany hastily decided to abandon nuclear power and fall back on Russian gas despite the annexation of Crimea. There is no doubt that Europe's dependence on Russian energy made Russia believe that the invasion of Ukraine would not meet much resistance in Europe and was a factor in the start of the war. Now the EU already accepts that we will burn more coal in the next decade because of the end of the use of Russian gas. This was recognized this week by Frans Timmermans in the presentation of the REPower EU plan. What a deal: we've cut back on nuclear power to go back to burning coal.
Two. The European Union prohibits fracking, but is not averse to importing gas from the United States produced with this technology. The Spanish Climate Change and Energy Transition Law also prohibits it, but a substantial fraction of the gas imported by Spain from the United States is produced in this way. That the votes are local seems to make us forget that the problem of emissions is global.
Three. With the price of energy skyrocketing, in a process that dates back many months before the Russian invasion, many European governments have decided to subsidize gasoline when one of the fundamental vectors of decarbonisation must be the reduction of energy consumption. Instead of adjusting taxes for inflation and letting families decide whether they want to buy more vegetables or maintain their gasoline consumption, the subsidy is only given if CO² is emitted. This measure, which would be logical for sectors that do not have the possibility of deciding whether they want to consume gasoline or not, such as carriers, is not compatible with the ecological blows of many European governments. And all that was missing was for the Bank of Spain to confirm that this subsidy is favoring families with more economic resources to a greater extent. Is this part of the just transition that is being talked about so much? Or is it one more measure added to the restrictions on movement for families with few resources who cannot afford a new car or, in the future, take out a mortgage to finance an energy-inefficient home?
For all of the above, I am surprised that from the events of recent months some draw the conclusion that the abandonment of non-renewable energies must be accelerated. It seems that the European Union, even before the Russian invasion, already turned ears to the wolf by proposing that gas and nuclear energy be considered green. Better that than end up going back to coal. The bottom line is that we need a smart energy transition that is as fast as possible subject to the constraints of a very complex economic and social system. Continuing in an unreal transition, which systematically fails in its objectives, demoralizes society and prevents the ultimate goal from being achieved: ending emissions and leaving a habitable world for future generations.
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