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Is the Iran war making a case for renewables · DEEP INSIGHT

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  Speaker 1: The world is facing an energy crisis not seen since
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  Speaker 1: the global oil crisis of the nineteen seventies. That's according
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  Speaker 1: to Fati Birol, the head of the International Energy Association.
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  Speaker 1: Since the US and Israel began their war against Iran,
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  Speaker 1: the world's energy infrastructure has been caught in the lurch.
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  Speaker 1: It has pushed up fuel prices from Asia to the
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  Speaker 1: Middle East, Africa and the Americas, exposing our energy systems
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  Speaker 1: to be fragile, and experts warn the worst is likely
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  Speaker 1: yet to come as supply chains worldwide come under increasing stress.
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  Speaker 1: Could our energy systems really break down? Can renewable energy
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  Speaker 1: really protect us from future shocks? And is our economy
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  Speaker 1: really as fragile as it was during the first oil crisis?
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  Speaker 2: It is more fragile because we have.
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  Speaker 3: A continual requirement for fossil fuels.
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  Speaker 1: Anthony Froggat is an energy analyst and senior director of Energy,
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  Speaker 1: Aviation and Shipping at the advocacy group TNE. Before that,
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  Speaker 1: he worked does a consultant for energy transition issues.
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  Speaker 3: So the global consumption of fossil fuels has continued to
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  Speaker 3: increase year on year, and we remain dependent on a
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  Speaker 3: very small number of states to supply the globe in
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  Speaker 3: terms of its fossil fuels, and there is more and
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  Speaker 3: more demand for these. And also fossil fuels are not
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  Speaker 3: only used within the energy sector, they are also part
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  Speaker 3: of the construction of petrochemicals in terms of oil. In
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  Speaker 3: terms of gas, we use around five percent of natural
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  Speaker 3: gas to make fertilizers, so they're also connected to food security.
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  Speaker 3: So in that way, society is highly abundant on fossil fuels.
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  Speaker 1: In the nineteen seventies, the Yum Kippur War, involving mainly Israel,
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  Speaker 1: Egypt and Syria, triggered one of the biggest energy crises.
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  Speaker 1: Many Arab nations announced they will stop supplying oil to
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  Speaker 1: Israel's allies. Prices shot up immediately. In fact, within months,
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  Speaker 1: global oil prices have quadrupled. Even today, our societies and
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  Speaker 1: economies remain heavily reliant on fossil fuels.
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  Speaker 3: So around eighty percent, so four fifths of our energy
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  Speaker 3: globally that's consumed and sold comes from fossil fuels, and
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  Speaker 3: the largest share of that is from oil. So oil
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  Speaker 3: and then coal. Coal isn't traded so much, most of
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  Speaker 3: it's used domestically. It's only about twenty percent of its
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  Speaker 3: traded and then natural gas. There's a large number of
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  Speaker 3: countries that are dependent on imported fossil fuels, and the
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  Speaker 3: ten largest exporting countries for both gas and oil provide
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  Speaker 3: around seventy percent.
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  Speaker 2: Of the global global oil and gas.
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  Speaker 3: So a small number of countries supply a large amount
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  Speaker 3: of the population with the majority of their energy. So
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  Speaker 3: in some ways that's the inherent problem that we have.
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  Speaker 3: It's further compounded, i would say, and is exactly what
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  Speaker 3: we're seeing now is that there is certain choke points
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  Speaker 3: or choke points or pinch points in the world. And
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  Speaker 3: the straight up Horn moves is an obvious example. Have
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  Speaker 3: twenty percent of the words oil and twenty percent of
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  Speaker 3: the world's LNG liquefied natural gas under normal circumstances going
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  Speaker 3: through that very narrow piece of c and that is
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  Speaker 3: what we're seeing now is the ability for states to
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  Speaker 3: stop that flow of stop the tankers, and this is
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  Speaker 3: having a huge impact.
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  Speaker 1: Analysts like Frogart argue that the Iran War is a
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  Speaker 1: reminder that global energy systems need a complete overhaul, and
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  Speaker 1: that the Iran War is making the case for renewables
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  Speaker 1: like wind, solar, hydro power and photovoltaikes are PV.
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  Speaker 2: For shot, So it's cheaper to do renewables.
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  Speaker 3: That is, to develop a new gas field, extract the gas,
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  Speaker 3: put it into a gas power station and then put
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  Speaker 3: that onto the grid. Why not shortcut it, buy the
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  Speaker 3: PV panels, put them in the system, and then you're
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  Speaker 3: generating much.
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  Speaker 2: Cheaper forms of electricity.
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  Speaker 3: So we have seen a huge shift towards renewable, but
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  Speaker 3: it's in some ways it's a big if we can
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  Speaker 3: use the metaphor a big oil tanker to turn around.
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  Speaker 3: There are some real success stories and the EU is
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  Speaker 3: one of these. What we saw in twenty twenty five
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  Speaker 3: for the first time ever is that solar and wind
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  Speaker 3: between them, contributed more to the EU's electricity grid than
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  Speaker 3: fossil fuels. So we've seen a ten percent rise in
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  Speaker 3: the use of renewable energies in this sorry ten percent
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  Speaker 3: rise in the use of solar and wind, so that
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  Speaker 3: they now contribute over thirty percent of the total electricity
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  Speaker 3: consumption within the EU. So in a five year period,
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  Speaker 3: that is a remarkable shift, and that is because we're
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  Speaker 3: seeing falling prices for the technologies.
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  Speaker 1: Spain, for instance, produces sixty percent of its energy through renewables,
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  Speaker 1: and Portugal met its entire energy requirement from green sources
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  Speaker 1: last year. This has blunted the shock of the current
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  Speaker 1: energy crisis, even if it could not eliminate the shock completely.
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  Speaker 3: So you have to have a system, You have to
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  Speaker 3: build out the grids. In the past, you had nuclear
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  Speaker 3: power plants and coal plants primarily providing the majority of electricity.
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  Speaker 3: So there were large centralized systems, and you are moving
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  Speaker 3: away from that into more decentralized system in which you
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  Speaker 3: have smaller units of generation be it solar or wind,
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  Speaker 3: or hydro or biomass, and you have micro level in
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  Speaker 3: terms of it's on people's rooftops. So you have a
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  Speaker 3: system that is much more dynamic, and you then need
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  Speaker 3: to invest in the grid to enable that to happen,
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  Speaker 3: to move away from that centralized.
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  Speaker 2: System into a more distributed system.
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  Speaker 3: So it is a transition that goes beyond just installing
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  Speaker 3: new solar panels or new wind turbines. You need to
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  Speaker 3: change the way in which the system operates.
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  Speaker 1: And what fundamental changes should the world pursue. He recommends
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  Speaker 1: taking pragmatic steps based on the lessons of the past
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  Speaker 1: to temper the world economy from future shocks.
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  Speaker 2: So on the short term, what can you do?
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  Speaker 3: There are behavioral measures that people can do, and we're
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  Speaker 3: starting to see that in different countries or different recommendations
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  Speaker 3: about changing the way in which you behave potentially lowering
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  Speaker 3: the speed limit, not wasting so much energy, and we've
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  Speaker 3: seen that case after case that is what can be done,
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  Speaker 3: and you can make huge changes in that regard. I
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  Speaker 3: think the second issue is to look at the existing
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  Speaker 3: policies and in some ways, again within the European context,
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  Speaker 3: we have this. We've had a previous all shot in
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  Speaker 3: twenty twenty two with Russia's full scale invasion of Ukraine.
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  Speaker 3: There was a number of measures that were put in
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  Speaker 3: place at the time in order to reduce dependency on
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  Speaker 3: fossil fuels, and so I would look back from a
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  Speaker 3: government perspective or a European wide perspective and see which
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  Speaker 3: of those measures works and which of them need further support.
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  Speaker 3: So we can look at existing policies and measures and
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  Speaker 3: say how can we answer these? And then my final
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  Speaker 3: question is maybe on the longer term, is be steadfast
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  Speaker 3: in our objective From a climate change perspective, we know
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  Speaker 3: and the world has agreed to this in terms of
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  Speaker 3: the Paris Agreement, is that we'd be seek to fully
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  Speaker 3: decarbonize or have net zero by twenty fifty and that
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  Speaker 3: is a strategic target and we need to stick to that.
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  Speaker 2: We need to stick to it for two reasons.
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  Speaker 3: One is from a climate change perspective, it's an imperative
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  Speaker 3: we need to reduce emissions to avoid the worst consequences
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  Speaker 3: of climate change. But secondly, we need to give that
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  Speaker 3: assurances to those investors that this is a serious objective
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  Speaker 3: and it's not just something that politicians will through throughout overnight.
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  Speaker 3: It's something that we will do and therefore encourages them
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  Speaker 3: to make those investments.
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  Speaker 1: The war and Iran continues to raise questions around global
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  Speaker 1: supply systems and the way we share the world's recess.
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  Speaker 1: Join us next time for a look at another facet.
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  Speaker 1: I'm nehal Juri. Thanks for watching.