Essay by Eric Worrall
According to Professor of Anthropology Ron Barrett, you don’t have to believe in climate action to benefit from renewable energy. But the professor has overlooked an important issue.
Can humanity address climate change without believing it? Medical history suggests it is possible
Published: July 10, 2024 10.14pm AEST
Ron Barrett
Professor of Anthropology, Macalester CollegeStrange as it may seem, early germ theorists could tell us a lot about today’s attitudes toward climate change.
While researching for a new book about the history of emerging infections, I found many similarities between early debates over the existence of microbes and current debates over the existence of global warming.
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This was the case in the latter decades of the 19th century, when germ-denying surgeons nevertheless adopted the antiseptic techniques of Joseph Lister.
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Responding to these claims, Lister stated:
“If anyone chooses to assume that the septic material is not of the nature of the living organisms, but a so-called chemical ferment destitute of vitality … such a notion, unwarranted though I believe it to be by any scientific evidence, will in a practical point of view be equivalent to a germ theory, since it will inculcate precisely the same methods of antiseptic management.”
Lister was more concerned with saving lives than winning arguments. As long as the surgeons adopted his methods, Lister cared little about their justifications. When it came to preventing infection, it was the behaviors rather than the beliefs that counted.
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Republicans are more likely to prioritize the economic benefits of renewable energy than Democrats, who tend to list global warming as their driving concern.
The economic benefits could explain why red states produce the largest share of America’s wind energy and why three of these states are among the nation’s top five producers of solar energy. Their adoption correlates with the geography of the wind and sun belts, where farmers see favorable returns for producing power and a stable source of income to buffer the price fluctuations of weather-sensitive crops. Livelihood is a powerful motivator.
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I completely understand why people who don’t believe in the climate crisis nevertheless respond to economic incentives.
A decade ago Anthony Watts discussed why he put solar panels on his own house.
The problem for Professor Ron Barrett’s theory of why people taking advantage of market distorting subsidies will drive adoption is renewable energy is in no way a solution to the world’s energy problems.
In the absence of affordable, long term energy storage, all renewable energy systems have to be backed by a duplicate dispatchable energy system, which can be activated at a moment’s notice when the renewables let you down – which they frequently do. The cost of maintaining two parallel systems – the fake renewable system, and the dispatchable system which produces power during the days or weeks when the renewables stop working, this is what drives up energy bills in states and nations which have embraced renewables.
In Australia, the threat the next government will pull the renewable subsidies and invest in nuclear instead appears to have dampened enthusiasm for investment. Renewables cannot compete with real energy, even nuclear power.
The charade of farmers filling their fields with renewables will only continue so long as taxpayer subsidies make it profitable to do so. The moment the subsidies dry up, so will the profits and new installations.
The great surgeon Joseph Lister is one of my heroes. There is a great documentary about Lister which I watched many years ago as a kid (I can’t find a link sorry), which details how Lister campaigned relentlessly, and made everyone in the hospital wash their hands and practice antiseptic and aseptic surgery, after he realised all the harm which transmission of contaminated material between patients was causing.
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