Is net-zero slowing progress on climate change?

by BRUCE ANDERSON, CEO, 247SOLAR INC.

An entire vocabulary has evolved to describe the concepts and goals around reducing carbon emissions to save a warming planet. Yet terms like renewable, net-zero, and zero carbon are not the same, and the differences are more than semantic. And, like many words, these terms are subject to different interpretations and can be used to obfuscate as well as to clarify.

For example, the term renewable came out of the environmental and sustainability movements of the mid-20th century, not today’s era of unchecked climate change. It is useless today. Sure, biofuels may be renewable because they come from plants, but they generally are made with dirty electricity, and when they burn, they produce emissions, including CO2. Biofuels are not a contributor to net-zero, let alone zero carbon.

Next comes a term that is perhaps even more insidious – net-zero. Net-zero has been in meaningful and public debate for some time, and it has become the default goal state for most efforts toward carbon reduction to mitigate climate change. But here’s the catch. Using net-zero allows everyone off the hook and slows down the pressure to go zero carbon, which is the only true way to impact climate change in a meaningful and permanent way.

NET-ZERO IS A DODGE There are several ways in which companies can claim net-zero (and associated energy credits) without actually doing anything that reduces carbon emissions into the atmosphere.

Companies can buy carbon-free electricity (CFE) but most, usually all, of the CFE they buy is from a PV operator during the day. The power these companies need at night is usually generated and delivered to them from a conventional power plant, or in the case of off-grid facilities, from dirty diesel gensets.

Companies can pay for carbon offsets, e.g., planting trees, and claim net-zero. But many such offsets have been shown to be bogus. The idea is they’re removing as much CO2 from the atmosphere as they’re putting into it but, best case, it’s a wash.

Most companies, when they claim net-zero, are producing CO2 on site and claim that they are doing something offsite to offset their emissions. Bottom line, net-zero means companies can use sleight-of-hand to claim they are doing something to aid the planet, when instead they are often engaged in a shell game, merely moving emissions around. Or, in the words of Etihad Airways CEO Tony Douglas in a recent article in Bloomberg, “it’s cheating.”

ZERO CARBON IS THE GOAL Net-zero is comparative – something positive in one place compared to something negative somewhere else. Such comparisons are often tough to measure and easy to fudge. Zero carbon is absolute. It does not need to be measured or compared with anything else. Something is either zero-carbon or it isn’t. CO2 is knowable. When sunshine strikes a PV cell, electricity happens. No CO2. When sunshine is reflected to create heat to produce power, electricity happens. No C02. When wind spins a turbine, electricity happens. No CO2.

The planet doesn’t care whether emissions come from your facility, or from your neighbor’s. The sole way a mine can have confidence that what they are doing is zero carbon is to make their own operations zero carbon. 247Solar Inc. envisions future generations with a sustainable world powered by abundant, low cost, zerocarbon energy. We’re grateful for any opportunity to help.

Bruce Anderson, CEO, 247Solar contact via https://247solar.com/