Roadmap 2050 - energy plan for Europe

[mwyalchen]

Rem Koolhaas has helped come up with a daring plan to run Europe on a grid of shared renewable energy – and redraw the map of the continent at the same time. ...

... Called Roadmap 2050, ... it combines the belief that drastic intervention is required to mitigate climate change, with a desire to give meaning and power to the European Union. It has been commissioned by the European Climate Foundation, a philanthropic body dedicated to promoting policies that reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and it aims to show how the EU can achieve an incredible-seeming target of an 80% reduction in carbon emissions by 2050. The proposal is being considered by the EU Council of Ministers, for their possible endorsement.

The proposal's starting point is the fact that renewable energy sources such as wind and sunshine are erratic and unreliable, which means they have to be supported by other forms of power. But they are also available in different quantities in different places – wind is abundant in Britain, sun in Spain – and in different seasons. The big idea is to create a power network across the continent linking all these sources, which could then compensate for each other. If it was windless in Britain but sunny in Spain, power could travel from them to us, and vice versa. ...

... OMA insists that its plan makes sense, even if you exclude climate issues. It has produced figures to show that the scheme would not cost all that much per head, especially when compared with road-building, war in Iraq, or bailing out bankers. They point out the benefit of reducing reliance on Middle Eastern oil and Russian gas. They argue that the economic benefits would outweigh the costs. They say that a reduction of even more than 80% could be achieved if North Africa, with all its sunshine, could be included in the grid. Their plan, they say, is "not rooted in apocalyptic hysteria", but is eminently practical.

It's a seductive proposition: go green and get richer. ...

More: http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/ ... m-koolhaas

[DaRC]

well hopefully it's an achievable plan and gets backing from the EU without some corporation derailling it.