DREAM OF BUYING TIME WITH FOSSIL FUELS

Governments and business are busy selling the impossible dream that by keeping fossil fuels burning humanity will be able to buy time before being forced into investing in large-scale renewable energy for mass consumption.

The fossil fuel industry continues to add fuel to its erroneous assumption that oil and coal-fired electricity plants can continue to be the major contributor for electricity generation while the world attempts to restrict CO2 emissions to a level that can contain climate warming temperatures to 2C degrees.

The fossil fuels lobby - that's heavily backed by the coal industry - continues to spin the line that cleaning carbon fuel through geosequestration is the silver bullet for solving the global warming and climate change challenge.

But even if 50% of CO2 of fossil fuels were some how cleaned and stored it wouldn't be enough to keep temperatures from rising more than 2C degrees. And despite all the hurdles that have to jumped over for geosquestration to be practical and modestly viable, governments and private funds continue to pour money into geosequestration research while neglecting the obvious need for renewable energy from solar, wind and ocean sources.

Geosequestration is energy-intensive and a considerable health hazard, which in comparison imakes the cost of storing nuclear waste seem inexpensive and safer.

The facts are that even if science can come up with a safe and economical method to sequester CO2, by the time it gets into operation, it would be too late to prevent atmospheric carbon dioxide rising to beyond 450 parts per million - the critical point climate science indicates will trigger a warming of Earth beyond human manageability.

Some economists argue that a large-scale investment in geosequestration will spur economies keep the coal industry alive without any fallout of major job losses and consumer spending down turns.

The hard economic truth is, however, that clean coal is totally unrealistic and driven by an old order of energy wealth that is gone passed its used by date. And if governments and the fossil industry want to buy time they would be much better off switching all the power generators from using coal to natural gas as a transitional measure.

But the long-term solution lies with concentrated solar thermal plants where the solar energy can be stored as heat to generate base-load power.

The new carbon economy is certain to provide a reality check for all industries that have been emitting CO and other poisonous gasses without any accountability and impunity.

The current price of carbon currently at $20 to $30 per tonne can be expected to rise rapidly to $50 as the world comes to grip with the value of carbon as an energy exchange. While the expanding market for solar energy will drive down costs through research, innovation and economies of scale.

The total cost of fitting solar energy to an average four-bedroom house is about $25,000. If the funds being allocated to clean coal was switched to mass-scale solar powering of the planet every home could would be supplied with abundant solar electricity for a one off price under $10, 000.

There is much in favour of subsidizing solar power to reduce CO2, which is not a class issue and nor should it be viewed as a welfare payment.