Global Apollo program wants to make green energy cheaper than coal
A team of scientists wants to quickly drive down the cost of renewable energy to the point that it's cheaper than coal within ten years' time. In order to do that, though, they need money -- lots and lots of money to the tune of $150 billion. That's why they founded the Global Apollo Programme, named as such because (in the words of one of the founders, Richard Layard of the London School of Economics ) "The challenge is as big as putting a man on the moon." The researchers envision the program as a collaboration between several nations, funding research that will make renewable energy a much more feasible option.
In particular, they want to concentrate on developing a more efficient storage technology for solar and wind energy, as well as smarter software for power grids. A battery or any other tech that can effectively store energy for use at night and other periods of heavy demand could lead to a more widespread use of renewable energy. That, in turn, could make keeping global warming under the 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit danger threshold possible. The scientists have recently presented their report at London's Royal Society, where one of the authors and former UK government chief scientist David King revealed that several countries have already shown "considerable interest." These include some European Union members, China, India, Japan, Korea, Mexico, United Arab Emirates and the United States
King is hoping to announce the first countries to sign up at the G-20 Antalya summit in Turkey in November this year, before the UN climate talks in Paris begin in December. The program expects each member country to invest 0.02% of its GDP to research and development of new technologies and promises to share results with all the participating nations. Sounds intriguing, but as Danish academic Bjorn Lomborg told Reuters: for renewable energy to become the cheapest way to generate electricity, governments must first end subsidies to fossil fuel companies.
[Image credit: NASA]
