When it comes to transport, the Jevons Paradox is called Downs–Thomson paradox. Every dollar invested in private cars takes way from shared cars or public transport. Just like every $ invested in fossils takes away from RE.
Every child can understand that moving 2000 kg to move 100 kg for 1-2 hours per day is overshoot. Like feeding 8 calories to an animal to get 1 calorie out;)
Also key to mention. We don't replace IC cars. We just add more cars. Old cars get exported to developing countries.
Driven Mad - Nothing better sums up the inadequacy of our current responses to the apocalyptic threat of accelerating climate change — or says more about how we have inflicted this desperate situation on ourselves — than the bizarre idea electric vehicles (EVs) somehow form part of the ‘solution’.
To survive, we should to be super focused on systemic overshoot like private cars and private ownership of beings that feel and think like we do. We now need transport and food solutions that can work for 8-10 billion or for nobody at all.
Some analytical errors here. I've been studying this field heavily for decades, and you're making known errors, so I'll help you out.
(1) Don't ever cite primary energy -- it's a garbage, fake-o number made up by oil companies. You want "final energy".
(2) EIA projections are always gross underestimates of solar and wind deployment, because EIA is in the pocket of oil companies. They've been wrong for decades. Don't cite them. The best projections in terms of accuracy have been from Greenpeace, second-best (which still underestimate) being from BNEF.
(3) There are no technical obstacles to adoption of electric construction equipment. Interestingly it's being adopted first in remote "off grid" mines in Australia, because the infrastructure overhead is so much lower than the infrastructure overhead of trucking in diesel fuel. It's also particularly popular in underground mines where oxygen is at a premium. Most of mining is deeply conservative and is not adopting this as fast as they should from a business/profit perspective.
(4) The Finnish paper you cited is garbage and should not be cited. It is flat out wrong about all its materials statements.
Jevons' Paradox is real and the behavior of the tech-bros who are building fake-AI (automated bullshit generators) and giant eyeballs is deranged and destructive, but so much of the rest of this article is contaminated by known-false oil company propaganda that it's not a good article.
I'm afraid I can't give you full links at this time (digging them out of my bookmarks is work and I'm not being paid for that work), but let me just say that BNEF and Lazard are relatively reliable sources for projections; the EIA and IEA are not, you can only use them for prior-years data.
That’s the single greatest chart in the history of both charts and humanity.
Makes a mockery of everything we claim we are, every institution we have, everything we try to say about hope and destiny.
Corporations own the fossil fuels in that chart, and we know where that chart is headed and what the biosocial effects of that rising history of fossil fuel use will be.
Still, we rise each day within the context of our own individual lives.
Thank you for discussing the Jevons paradox. It is similar to the Rebound Effect
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rebound_effect_(conservation)
It is due to moral self licencing - using brain power to play stupid.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-licensing
When it comes to transport, the Jevons Paradox is called Downs–Thomson paradox. Every dollar invested in private cars takes way from shared cars or public transport. Just like every $ invested in fossils takes away from RE.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Downs%E2%80%93Thomson_paradox
Every child can understand that moving 2000 kg to move 100 kg for 1-2 hours per day is overshoot. Like feeding 8 calories to an animal to get 1 calorie out;)
Also key to mention. We don't replace IC cars. We just add more cars. Old cars get exported to developing countries.
https://www.visionofhumanity.org/second-hand-cars-out-of-sight-out-of-mind/
https://www.energymonitor.ai/transport/africas-bumpy-road-to-an-electric-vehicle-future/
More science background
Transport within earth system boundaries: "Electric vehicles can also not replace the existing fleet to say nothing of meeting growing demand"
https://www.nature.com/articles/s44333-024-00005-5
Private cars are an illusion
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S259019822400157X
Driven Mad - Nothing better sums up the inadequacy of our current responses to the apocalyptic threat of accelerating climate change — or says more about how we have inflicted this desperate situation on ourselves — than the bizarre idea electric vehicles (EVs) somehow form part of the ‘solution’.
https://jacksondamian.substack.com/p/driven-mad
To survive, we should to be super focused on systemic overshoot like private cars and private ownership of beings that feel and think like we do. We now need transport and food solutions that can work for 8-10 billion or for nobody at all.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LQTuDttP2Yg
Some analytical errors here. I've been studying this field heavily for decades, and you're making known errors, so I'll help you out.
(1) Don't ever cite primary energy -- it's a garbage, fake-o number made up by oil companies. You want "final energy".
(2) EIA projections are always gross underestimates of solar and wind deployment, because EIA is in the pocket of oil companies. They've been wrong for decades. Don't cite them. The best projections in terms of accuracy have been from Greenpeace, second-best (which still underestimate) being from BNEF.
(3) There are no technical obstacles to adoption of electric construction equipment. Interestingly it's being adopted first in remote "off grid" mines in Australia, because the infrastructure overhead is so much lower than the infrastructure overhead of trucking in diesel fuel. It's also particularly popular in underground mines where oxygen is at a premium. Most of mining is deeply conservative and is not adopting this as fast as they should from a business/profit perspective.
(4) The Finnish paper you cited is garbage and should not be cited. It is flat out wrong about all its materials statements.
Jevons' Paradox is real and the behavior of the tech-bros who are building fake-AI (automated bullshit generators) and giant eyeballs is deranged and destructive, but so much of the rest of this article is contaminated by known-false oil company propaganda that it's not a good article.
I'm afraid I can't give you full links at this time (digging them out of my bookmarks is work and I'm not being paid for that work), but let me just say that BNEF and Lazard are relatively reliable sources for projections; the EIA and IEA are not, you can only use them for prior-years data.
Great article, I found your Substack through Notes, and am happy I did.
That’s the single greatest chart in the history of both charts and humanity.
Makes a mockery of everything we claim we are, every institution we have, everything we try to say about hope and destiny.
Corporations own the fossil fuels in that chart, and we know where that chart is headed and what the biosocial effects of that rising history of fossil fuel use will be.
Still, we rise each day within the context of our own individual lives.