Sorry, I know I'm late to the party here; only recently discovered this splendid (and more importantly this fellow Wodehousian-soubriquéed...) blog. Hope nobody minds!
[TL;DR: the utility landscape is bloody complicated and whilst it's true that the high peaks represent improving access to resources rather than improving efficiency of resources we already have access to and the troughs represent 'improving-efficiency-only traps', it's far from obvious that the best next step for our particular civilisation, for where we happen to be on the utility landscape right now, is a resource-improving rather than an efficiency-improving step.]
I'm skeptical of Psmith's criticism of efficiency-improving over resource-improving (whether that resource is energy or anything else); obviously in the long run resource-seeking must win out and efficiency-seeking must stagnate, for all the reasons described, but it's not clear to me that we're at a point in the utility-landscape where *specifically the best single next step* is definitely a resource-seeking one rather than an efficiency-seeking one.
Right now, there are obviously gains to be had from both efficiency-improving and resource-improving and even if energy is theoretically unlimited (or limited only at a Kardashev-scale that's so far beyond our needs we may as well call it unlimited) it *is* limited in the practical sense that we don't have the political, social, and to a lesser extent technological, mechanisms to extract vastly more of it right this moment, whereas there are efficiency-improvements currently being implemented successfully: so, whilst we structure society, develop technology, etc. to extract more energy, why must we eschew the available efficiency gains that are plentiful and immediately available?
Steam engines only took over from water wheels after a period of development and refinement (made possible in part by their synergy with waterlogged coal mines, as Psmith fascinatingly relates); the technology (and the social gumption) to improve our energy resource extraction appears to need a similar period of development and refinement - and if you can measure this in terms of eg. trends in the cost-across-time of offshore wind or whatever, we do appear to be progressing through this necessary period of refinement. However - we need to make changes to our energy usage *now*, if we're to avert climate catastrophe, and the resource-improving interventions aren't entirely ready to take the strain; it seems crazy to criticise the efficiency-improving interventions that may be the only thing that staves off disaster for long enough to allow the resource-improving interventions to mature.
(By analogy: if a town's energy needs had risen by 1% -say, owing to a gold-rush-style immigration boom- on the same afternoon that the steam engine was invented, it would be madness for the town's burghers to say "well, we *could* improve our water wheels to eke out a 1% gain to cover our increased needs and then nobody has to go hungry... but probably in a decade's time steam engines will be better than water wheels so in the meantime let's just do nothing"..)
I’m not convinced that climate change is either urgent or solvable with increased efficiency. However, I believe you are correct that sometimes focusing on increasing efficiency is the way to go.
The obvious example is already given in the essay. If it was takes 999 joules to get 1000 back it’s better to increase efficiency 1% rather than double area under cultivation.
So, basically, when you are just under break even efficiency, increase efficiency. When you are already pretty efficient, don’t keep hammering on it—head for the frontier.
Y'know how, in project management, addressing a problem in the design phase is far cheaper and safer than addressing it during deployment? I suppose I would say that climate change is like project management: the sooner we address it the less it will cost us overall (in lives and money). Maybe "urgent" was the wrong choice of word for expressing that, I don't know.
For climate change being insoluble by increased efficiency, I completely agree with you! I merely say that an "efficiency now + capacity later" approach will cost less (again in lives and money) than a "wait for capacity " approach.
I also fully agree with (and like the phrasing of!) your summary, "when you're already pretty efficient, don't keep hammering on it; head for the frontier", but I think in the essay (which I admit I've not re-read before commenting..) this policy was presented as a slippery-slope/trap where once you start improving efficiency it's difficult or impossible to "retool" to improving capacity, with the implication that we should forego efficiency improvements entirely lest we fall into the efficiency-only trap - this is the core of my disagreement with Psmith, I think. (Though of course if I misunderstood Psmith here I'm sure the fault was entirely mine!)
Look, I hate degrowthers as much as the next guy, but the last point is just dumb. Energy consumption is not progress; it is only correlated with progress, and this correlation gets weaker and weaker as you move beyond the Malthusian nightmare.
Yes, we will need a lot of energy to reach the stars... but the hard part is figuring out how, not consuming a lot of energy. For that, you can just keep the lights on for longer.
I am now realizing that dropping the book out if fatigue at approximately the Industrial Revolution was basically the right choice. Your reframing if the (very boring) pre-modern part of the book gave me a new appreciation for the ascendancy of civilization and further cemented my conviction that More Energy Good.
One thought about efficiency. It’s interesting that in general, resource (material, spatial, temporal) constraints drive important and interesting innovations. Vacuum tubes-->transistors--> ICs, for instance. I think that when most people think about efficiency, they have in mind these sorts of inventions, but in fact this is a category error. Any constraint that is not primarily energetic can be surmounted by the application of MOAR JOULES. Limits on how much energy we can deploy are clearly suicidal, but most people don’t understand this distinction.
This energy decline/stagnation starting in the 1970s isn't a sign of collapse, it means we've broken the game. Manufacturing moved overseas, and the US economy became dominated by finance, tech, and service industries, all of which use less energy. But our wealth kept growing, so I'll take that as a win.
Nice job pinpointing 1971! Now what if the flat line of energy consumption per capita since then (which might actually be a falling line once you factor in energy losses at the source) is not (only) due to intellectual laziness, lack of willpower etc. but to an actual hard limit? After all, we don't have a world government, and many different countries have tried, each in their own way, to access cheap new energy: fission, fusion, geothermal, hydroelectric, whatever.
I am not aware of any country that has thrived on a different source of energy than oil, and oil isn't cheap anymore.
>In contrast, the best steam engines had more like 2% efficiency when coal started displacing water power.5 But just as horses were less efficient but more powerful than oxen, there is just so much coal, and it’s so incredibly energy-dense, that coal-powered civilization was a giant step forward in wealth, convenience, and capabilities over water-powered civilization.
Wait a bit. This sounds like the Western way of thinking is wasteful, polluting, selfish, sort-sighted, screws up the planet and leads to colonialism and resource wars. It is also a stupid brute force way of solving problems. The Asian way of making do with less looks way more respectful, harmonious and foresighted.
I don't want the stars - just to waste and destroy even more of creation? I want the Shire.
The horse was key to unlocking vast reserves of energy even prior to its usage as an agricultural draft animal. The Proto-Indo European adoption of nomadic pastoralism — moving around the steppe on horse drawn wagons, relying on animal byproducts for sustenance — allowed them to convert the endless grasslands of the steppe into usable energy. Newly mobile and fueled by calorie-rich dairy, these Bronze Age tribes harnessed the energy of the steppe to expand across Eurasia. Research has shown that when PIE groups arrived in forested Northern Europe, they actually worked to geo-engineer the landscape so that it bore greater resemblance to the Eurasian steppe.
"Homo floresiensis began to reduce their basal metabolic load first by becoming smaller and then by giving up their brains. After a few thousand years of evolution, we see skeletons that are stunted, deformed, and with skulls that have room for brains no larger than those of a chimpanzee. How wonderful. Just think how energy efficient they must have been."
I've got an essay you'll probably hate but might find interesting.
Excellent reframing of the concept of “efficiency” when it comes to energy (and other things)! In America, we've been conditioned to think of "efficiency" as only a good thing, when in reality, that mindset means resigning yourself to stagnation and scarcity. Very insightful essay!
Sorry, I know I'm late to the party here; only recently discovered this splendid (and more importantly this fellow Wodehousian-soubriquéed...) blog. Hope nobody minds!
[TL;DR: the utility landscape is bloody complicated and whilst it's true that the high peaks represent improving access to resources rather than improving efficiency of resources we already have access to and the troughs represent 'improving-efficiency-only traps', it's far from obvious that the best next step for our particular civilisation, for where we happen to be on the utility landscape right now, is a resource-improving rather than an efficiency-improving step.]
I'm skeptical of Psmith's criticism of efficiency-improving over resource-improving (whether that resource is energy or anything else); obviously in the long run resource-seeking must win out and efficiency-seeking must stagnate, for all the reasons described, but it's not clear to me that we're at a point in the utility-landscape where *specifically the best single next step* is definitely a resource-seeking one rather than an efficiency-seeking one.
Right now, there are obviously gains to be had from both efficiency-improving and resource-improving and even if energy is theoretically unlimited (or limited only at a Kardashev-scale that's so far beyond our needs we may as well call it unlimited) it *is* limited in the practical sense that we don't have the political, social, and to a lesser extent technological, mechanisms to extract vastly more of it right this moment, whereas there are efficiency-improvements currently being implemented successfully: so, whilst we structure society, develop technology, etc. to extract more energy, why must we eschew the available efficiency gains that are plentiful and immediately available?
Steam engines only took over from water wheels after a period of development and refinement (made possible in part by their synergy with waterlogged coal mines, as Psmith fascinatingly relates); the technology (and the social gumption) to improve our energy resource extraction appears to need a similar period of development and refinement - and if you can measure this in terms of eg. trends in the cost-across-time of offshore wind or whatever, we do appear to be progressing through this necessary period of refinement. However - we need to make changes to our energy usage *now*, if we're to avert climate catastrophe, and the resource-improving interventions aren't entirely ready to take the strain; it seems crazy to criticise the efficiency-improving interventions that may be the only thing that staves off disaster for long enough to allow the resource-improving interventions to mature.
(By analogy: if a town's energy needs had risen by 1% -say, owing to a gold-rush-style immigration boom- on the same afternoon that the steam engine was invented, it would be madness for the town's burghers to say "well, we *could* improve our water wheels to eke out a 1% gain to cover our increased needs and then nobody has to go hungry... but probably in a decade's time steam engines will be better than water wheels so in the meantime let's just do nothing"..)
I’m not convinced that climate change is either urgent or solvable with increased efficiency. However, I believe you are correct that sometimes focusing on increasing efficiency is the way to go.
The obvious example is already given in the essay. If it was takes 999 joules to get 1000 back it’s better to increase efficiency 1% rather than double area under cultivation.
So, basically, when you are just under break even efficiency, increase efficiency. When you are already pretty efficient, don’t keep hammering on it—head for the frontier.
Y'know how, in project management, addressing a problem in the design phase is far cheaper and safer than addressing it during deployment? I suppose I would say that climate change is like project management: the sooner we address it the less it will cost us overall (in lives and money). Maybe "urgent" was the wrong choice of word for expressing that, I don't know.
For climate change being insoluble by increased efficiency, I completely agree with you! I merely say that an "efficiency now + capacity later" approach will cost less (again in lives and money) than a "wait for capacity " approach.
I also fully agree with (and like the phrasing of!) your summary, "when you're already pretty efficient, don't keep hammering on it; head for the frontier", but I think in the essay (which I admit I've not re-read before commenting..) this policy was presented as a slippery-slope/trap where once you start improving efficiency it's difficult or impossible to "retool" to improving capacity, with the implication that we should forego efficiency improvements entirely lest we fall into the efficiency-only trap - this is the core of my disagreement with Psmith, I think. (Though of course if I misunderstood Psmith here I'm sure the fault was entirely mine!)
This reminds me of John Michael Greer's idea of "catabolic collapse". See, in particular, his comments about the 1970s: https://www.resilience.org/stories/2011-01-20/onset-catabolic-collapse/
Look, I hate degrowthers as much as the next guy, but the last point is just dumb. Energy consumption is not progress; it is only correlated with progress, and this correlation gets weaker and weaker as you move beyond the Malthusian nightmare.
Yes, we will need a lot of energy to reach the stars... but the hard part is figuring out how, not consuming a lot of energy. For that, you can just keep the lights on for longer.
I am now realizing that dropping the book out if fatigue at approximately the Industrial Revolution was basically the right choice. Your reframing if the (very boring) pre-modern part of the book gave me a new appreciation for the ascendancy of civilization and further cemented my conviction that More Energy Good.
One thought about efficiency. It’s interesting that in general, resource (material, spatial, temporal) constraints drive important and interesting innovations. Vacuum tubes-->transistors--> ICs, for instance. I think that when most people think about efficiency, they have in mind these sorts of inventions, but in fact this is a category error. Any constraint that is not primarily energetic can be surmounted by the application of MOAR JOULES. Limits on how much energy we can deploy are clearly suicidal, but most people don’t understand this distinction.
This energy decline/stagnation starting in the 1970s isn't a sign of collapse, it means we've broken the game. Manufacturing moved overseas, and the US economy became dominated by finance, tech, and service industries, all of which use less energy. But our wealth kept growing, so I'll take that as a win.
Nice job pinpointing 1971! Now what if the flat line of energy consumption per capita since then (which might actually be a falling line once you factor in energy losses at the source) is not (only) due to intellectual laziness, lack of willpower etc. but to an actual hard limit? After all, we don't have a world government, and many different countries have tried, each in their own way, to access cheap new energy: fission, fusion, geothermal, hydroelectric, whatever.
I am not aware of any country that has thrived on a different source of energy than oil, and oil isn't cheap anymore.
>In contrast, the best steam engines had more like 2% efficiency when coal started displacing water power.5 But just as horses were less efficient but more powerful than oxen, there is just so much coal, and it’s so incredibly energy-dense, that coal-powered civilization was a giant step forward in wealth, convenience, and capabilities over water-powered civilization.
Wait a bit. This sounds like the Western way of thinking is wasteful, polluting, selfish, sort-sighted, screws up the planet and leads to colonialism and resource wars. It is also a stupid brute force way of solving problems. The Asian way of making do with less looks way more respectful, harmonious and foresighted.
I don't want the stars - just to waste and destroy even more of creation? I want the Shire.
This is splendid, thank you
The horse was key to unlocking vast reserves of energy even prior to its usage as an agricultural draft animal. The Proto-Indo European adoption of nomadic pastoralism — moving around the steppe on horse drawn wagons, relying on animal byproducts for sustenance — allowed them to convert the endless grasslands of the steppe into usable energy. Newly mobile and fueled by calorie-rich dairy, these Bronze Age tribes harnessed the energy of the steppe to expand across Eurasia. Research has shown that when PIE groups arrived in forested Northern Europe, they actually worked to geo-engineer the landscape so that it bore greater resemblance to the Eurasian steppe.
"Homo floresiensis began to reduce their basal metabolic load first by becoming smaller and then by giving up their brains. After a few thousand years of evolution, we see skeletons that are stunted, deformed, and with skulls that have room for brains no larger than those of a chimpanzee. How wonderful. Just think how energy efficient they must have been."
I've got an essay you'll probably hate but might find interesting.
https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/3caZ7LhMsvsS7kRrz/hobbit-manifesto
Excellent reframing of the concept of “efficiency” when it comes to energy (and other things)! In America, we've been conditioned to think of "efficiency" as only a good thing, when in reality, that mindset means resigning yourself to stagnation and scarcity. Very insightful essay!
Nice. I listened to this as an audiobook and didn't find it that dry - loved it tbh
You may enjoy this niche Smil meme:
https://twitter.com/misha_saul/status/1531037312771321856?s=20
Good post. I like the footnotes even more than the text (more concise?).