“21st Century Energy Transition – The Global Challenge of our Time”

Presentation and Conversation with Dr. Brad Hayes 

Affordable, abundant and reliable energy is fundamental to human well-being and prosperity. For the past 200 years, human lives have improved immensely as more and more people have gained access to energy, primarily in the form of fossil fuels – coal, petroleum and natural gas. As this energy transition continues into the 21st century, many challenges are arising as we strive to achieve energy security and to minimize associated environmental issues.

We derive energy today from a variety of sources, from animal waste to nuclear fission. Each nation generates energy from the resources available to them, which vary widely in price and availability across the globe. Changing our energy sources to meet particular objectives, such as minimizing greenhouse gas emissions while maintaining energy security, presents massive implementation challenges that vary tremendously by region.

Effective actions to meet our energy goals require well-informed energy policy – meaning that both the public and policy-makers must learn a great deal more about energy to support them in setting reasonable goals and priorities, informed by scientific and engineering realities. It’s key to realize that energy security is the top priority for every human being on Earth, and that other goals must be addressed with this fact in mind. A variety of polarized viewpoints makes the learning process very challenging and impedes our progress, as demonstrated by the number of energy policy failures affecting billions of people today.

Making the 21st Century Energy Transition work well for humanity is the global challenge of our time.