Our favorite climate numbers

Welcome to Zero.

I'm Oscar Boyd and I'm Christine Driscol and we're the producers and Zero.

And joining us is our host ak keat Rathy Actua. Good to have you here, nice to be here. Thanks for costing me.

Well, we had to cost you because we are doing something different today. We are going to play a game, a guessing game, and I get to win. You might win, I don't know. We'll have to see. But as you know, we are always talking about climate numbers that are out there.

To go the rules? Yes, So the game is simple. Each of us will present one number and then the other two have to figure out what that number represents. Each person and they can ask three questions, also ask for a few clues if you get stuck, and then you have to guess.

Ok. Shot do you copy?

I do, and it's simple enough.

Okay, great, So like we're just going to a practice around right now. There's no winning or losing, we're just learning. So my number is fifty.

One okay, So I might ask is that a percentage?

Very very good guess, ask for it is a percentage.

And I might ask is it to do with fossil fuels?

It is not a fossil fuel related number.

So we continue in that fashion. Christine, you might give us a couple of clues as well, but eventually we'd get to the answer, which is.

Fifty one percent is the percentage of Sweden's electricity production that came from renewables in April this year, and it was a new record.

That's cool.

Sweden's also got nuclear so it's getting there up there with its carbon free grid. Now you give this number away, but I'm still interested in this price. What is it? That's a good question. So this is a made up game, and we thought we'd give the winner a bit of a made up prize. So the winner today gets one whole carbon offset.

The worst gift you can give me, right, fantastic?

All right, Well, let's play the game, which for now is called whose number is it? Anyway?

Okay? Actually, this time it's for real. Do you want to do the honors and kick off our inorgal game of whose number is it?

Anyway?

Thirty two billion?

Thirty two billion? It's a big number. So I'm going to guess that this is a monetary figure. Correct.

I like that you say monetary figure. I was gonna be like, is it money? Go very elegant?

Okay, So I don't think I've ever used the words figured before. I think it's come out today.

What's the monetary figure? Guessing game? Okay? Is this US dollars? It is?

Okay? Is the money coming from a private source or a public slash governmental source?

A private source?

Oh? And has this money been spent or will it be spent in the future? Spent?

That's what I was going to ask.

Okay, I I think it's time to ask for a clue.

Oh yeah, can we have a clue.

It's got to do with oil companies.

It's been spent already, and it's good news. Okay, I'm gonna guess it. I'm gonna guess that this is I guess my final guess. I think thirty two billion dollars is the amount of money that has been spent by a single oil company in researching carbon capture and sequestration.

And oscar I'm going to say it's the amount of money that US oil companies shifted into renewables last year. So Christina're wildly optimistic. I don't think a single oil company is spent that much money on carbon capture research. That would be a lot of money to be spent on carbon capture research. I mean, typically a carbon capture plant that captures about a million tons is going to be about a billion a billion and a half dollars.

All of this is organic. Your fossil fields are organic.

But I also was thinking about I was also thinking oil isn't going to do carbon capture and sequestration. It's going to be a coal plant.

No, you're right in that oil and gas companies are the companies that will build most of the carbon capture plants because they are the companies that can handle large amounts of gases, which is what you need to do and to do carbon capture and so it's in the right area, but the wrong ballpark, and OSCAR is in the right direction, but it's not all renewables. So thirty two billion dollars is the total amount of money spent by oil majors on low carbon investments in twenty twenty two.

Wow.

What is striking about this number, though, is that even though this number has gone up quite a bit in recent years as a share of the total spend on the energy transition, it has remained static since twenty eighteen. So oil and gas companies, even as they're spending more on low carbon investments, their total share is only three percent of the energy transition and has been the same since twenty eighteen roughly.

So, you mean, despite all the adverts we see on TV saying that they're spending loads and loads and loads on renewables, it's not really hot. Well, nothing's changed. I mean we knew that. You know, there are currently regulators out to get oil and gas companies to make sure they don't use green wasshy terms like carbon neutral and so green washing in the advertising of oil and gas

All kinds of things, so that would be not just renewables, but batteries, but also carbon capture, capturing methane emissions or stopping leaks would count anything that really reduces emissions.

Actually, that was a great first number. Who won the first round?

Well, I think you were closed, so Oscar, you win, But that means Christine gets a reward and she gets to go next.

Okay, my number is six point one.

Ooh, that's one of my favorite numbers.

Ow very small number, or is it? Well, it's gotta be six point one degree celsius because then we'll be roasted and that's not good.

Nears.

No, I was thinking, should I give you the metric as a hint? Straight away? I'm ready to make a deal.

Do you think it would be impossible without the metric?

No, but I think the metric will make it go faster.

Let's they're around a guessing first, so six point one is it a monetary figure?

No, it is not.

Well, if it's not monetary, it's a unit to measure what a physical thing.

Yeah, it's definitely something that's physical, but you can't truly observe with the naked eye. And I'll also give you another hint, which is it is certainly something that we're using right now.

Wow, that's hard.

Can I tell you what the thing we're using right now is?

Either tell us that or tell us the unit. I think that'll be useful.

Okay, we're all using electricity right now, which is a form of.

Energy.

Yes, so I'll give you the metric.

This is gigawatts, six point one gigawatts. Is this related to the installation of a certain type of technology.

Yes, yes it is.

I think you're burning to your guests, man, that was obvious. Is it an installation of a form of energy that's renewables and in your part of America?

Okay, yes, it is installation of renewables. And I will say that it is in like my part of America, and that it is all of America.

Six point one gigawats.

That's too little for wind, that's too little for solar.

So is it that Hang on, you haven't guessed the time scale?

Is this on an annual timescale?

No, it's sub annual.

Sub annual.

Yeah, probably a monthly number. Yeah, I mean, and I could guess it would be the monthly installation of wind power in all of America?

Oscar Uh, are you ready to do your final guests?

I'll do my final guest because I don't really know what it is, so I'm just going to make something up. Is it the total capacity of new batteries installed in houses in assesson month?

No, it's it's not so. The timescale is a very bloomberg timescale, which is Q one. And so this was the amount of solar capacity added in the United States just in Q one. This is the most solar capacity that's been added in like the United States in the first quarter, which is very exciting. Actually looks upset, like you might not think this is real.

No, no, no, I am upset, But I will tell you why exactly why.

Okay, I saw this number researching something's about solar and I was like, wow, that's very exciting. So in like the first it's just this just this one quarter which is like just past. It was like just over fifty percent of all new electric generation in the US, which was very exciting. And we are on track. This hasn't happened yet, but we're on track to have half of all new generation in the US that's added to be in solar.

It is good news. Why I'm surprised by it, and maybe I should really not be, is how far behind America is compared to China. The number I had in my mind of solar is that China is going to install one hundred and fifty four gigawarts of solar in twenty twenty three. Divide that by four. That means roughly forty gigawarts of solar in a quarter. That's roughly seven times the amount of solar that America installed in Q one. We have a long way to go.

Yeah, I think that American industry should be more committed to beating China. Maybe this is like the only area that I would condone that kind of like blind competition. But I do think it's really good that half of new US electric generation is going to be solar.

It is also fair that new generation in America will be a smaller number compared to China, where energy demand is growing much much more rapidly, whereas actually energy demand in America is falling.

Also, I am not like too much of a booster. I was like, this is so great, but also, you know, what does this even represent in our electricity mix? And it's just you know, natural gas is it by a long shot. Another exciting thing is just like, so, for instance, if we are adding about they're protecting twenty gigaottes of additional solar generation, but the last year eleven gigaatts of coal was retired. So for perspectives, that's pretty good.

Christine, I've got a question for you, which is, yeah, as you're driving around the US at the moment, do you feel like you're seeing more solar?

Biking around? I see a lot more solar. I went on a really long bike trip recently and when we were coming back, we passed like a utility scale solar generation field and it was really shocking to see, honestly, because most of my life I didn't see that. I also see tons of houses just where I live with solar panels on their roofs, and it feels very exciting also very like hilariously enough, someone on the local news was like, you might think that Wisconsin can't use solar

And you know, to be fair, I dumped on America because of China's numbers. A closer comparison would be Europe. And even Europe is, my goodness, so much further ahead than America. In twenty twenty two, Europe installed forty gigawats of solar, so that's all already twice what America is going to install this year roughly.

Hey, the good news is people are installing solo. And on that showy note, let's go to the break. Yeh hi, it's sucksh. I'll be traveling to Singapore, Sydney, Melbourne, and Delhi over the next few weeks to record a few episodes of Zero. I'll be hosting meetups and eat city for those interested in talking about climate solutions. If you'd like to join, please fill the Google form in the show notes. You can find all the dates and details there.

Welcome back to the show. We've got some more numbers to guess, Oscar. What is your number that you've brought?

My number is thirty thousand.

This is a number of people.

You think it's a number of people, Yes, I do. It is not a number of people. Okay, it's a good number of people.

I was going to go, it's the number of cyclists doing something.

Is it a monetary unit or not?

It is not a monetary unit. It is not. Would you like a clue?

I think I want a unit clue. I want a unit clue.

I'm not going to give you a unit clue because it gets this too close too quickly. So I'm just going to give you a clue. It's to do with a country that Actuat just visited.

Paris, which is not a country, France. I think this is a distance. I think this is a distance. Is it a distance? It is a distance, yes, okay. I think it's going to be something about rail.

I think it's going to be the kilometers of bike lane in France.

Oh, that's annoyingly on point.

Yes, yes, and getting the offset Yes.

Was close too.

She gave it.

This is good. It's too no, so this is very timely because of the tour of France is just about to begin. In fact, depending on when this episode goes out, it already might be halfway through. So Yes, thirty thousand is thirty thousand kilometers, and that is the number of kilometers of new cycle lanes that are going to be built in France by twenty twenty seven, new new cycle lanes in France by twenty twenty seven. And just for perspective, thirty thousand is about three quarters of the length of

Where are they building it? Like, are they so for instance, like here all of our spike lanes are like next to all railroads. Are they making new ones or is it like I don't know, is there anything like that?

Yeah? The main focus is between cities and in kind of more provincial cities. I think Paris has done a very good job, especially during the pandemic. One of the big success stories was how much they'd managed to expand their cycle network. But I think the plan Is by twenty thirty. They want to link all those cities together to create like a huge national cycle network. And a

Paris was the first continental European city I visited in two thousand and nine, and the difference between that memory of Paris where I went around it was February, was very cold, went around taking lots and lots of photographs with gloves on and seeing really no bike lanes to today, when there's so many backplanes. It's pretty apparent.

Yeah, I mean, it's an amazing thing. If they get that many cycle lanes all around the country, I think it is going to transform how people get around.

Yeah, especially with e bikes.

Yeah, e bikes, and that's a huge part of the you know, they've got something like five hundred million euros and subsidies for people to buy new bikes. They want to improve station parking and everything. So it's a whole unified strategy that they want to turn France into the true true nation of cycling, which it kind of already is with the Tour de France.

All right, cool, so akshat. What was your guiding? Like, what was your strategy for finding your numbers?

I found six numbers in ten minutes, all numbers that are positive for the climate. And I did that by just going through my own tweets. Oh, I go too far.

Three days of tweets and I had the six numbers. I had more than six numbers. It's like the ones I really that we should talk about.

That's a great tip for reporters, just like treat your Twitter feed like your notebook of things you're comfortable sharing, and it's a great resource for stuff like this. Wow, that's so funny. Maybe I'll start tweeting.

I'll go in about you.

How do you pick your numbers?

I'm a subscriber to a newsleticlled Future Crunch, which if you haven't heard of it, I'd recommend subscribing to it. The whole thing is picking positive numbers and bits of data and stories that kind of fly below the radar, but are usually quite gradual improvements in various things. They do a lot of stuff about medicine, about conservation, and also good climate numbers as well. So this thirty thousand kilometer figure that came from the Future Crunch newsletter, Wow, Christine.

I have been working on an episode that's going to be about solar power. So I've been spending some time looking into how much it's grown. And I'm always very skeptical of positive numbers, and so I wanted to make sure I knew exactly like what the US electric generation

Thank you guys, Thank you.

Yeah, this was a fun one.

Thanks for playing Who's number is it? Anyway?

Thank you for listening to zero. Let us know what you thought of this format at zero port at Bloomberg dot net.

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With, and feel free to tweet at me with any inspiring climate numbers. You never know we might feature them on a future episode.

Zeros produces me Oscar Boyd, and Senior producer is Christine driscoll Our theme music is by Wonderly Special Thanks this week to care Binjum and if you're interested in all the numbers we shared in this episode, check out the show notes.

I'm Akshatrati back next week