ABSTRACT

For decades, Hermann Scheer was one of the world's leading proponents of renewable energy. In this, his last book before his death in 2010, he lays out his vision for a planet 100% powered by renewables and examines the fundamental ethical and economic imperatives for such a shift. And most importantly, he demonstrates why the time for this transition is now. In Scheer's view, talk of bridging technologies such as carbon capture and storage or nuclear energy even (and perhaps especially) by environmentalists is actively damaging the more the pressing agenda of the move to 100% renewable energy. Instead, he offers up examples of the technologies which are working (economically) today and details the policy and market conditions which would allow them to flourish.

chapter |14 pages

Introduction

Energy change: The ultimate challenge

part I|84 pages

Taking stock

chapter 1|24 pages

No Alternative to Renewable Energy

The long suppressed physical imperative

chapter 2|43 pages

Methods and Psychology of Slowing Down

Paralysis, delays and (un)willing alliances

chapter 3|15 pages

Super-Grids as Pseudo-Progressive Brakes

DESERTEC and the North Sea Project, the new megalomania

part |74 pages

People, scope for creativity, and technologies for 100 per cent renewable energy

chapter 4|30 pages

Speeding Up

The free development of renewable energy instead of technocratic planning

chapter 5|14 pages

Productive Fantasy

Energy change as an economic imperative

chapter 6|19 pages

Agenda 21 Reloaded

Global federal initiatives for energy change

chapter 7|9 pages

A Value Decision

Social ethics instead of energy economism