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Not impressed with Václav Smil
Everyone apparently knows the world famous Czech energy expert Václav Smil. Renowned author and reader, Bill Gates' favourite thinker, speaker at world class conferences with decades of experience.
That track record and reputation made him quite intriguing to my eyes so I started reading and listening to him. And I have to say... I am disappointed and not impressed in the slightest.
In every speech I heard I heard the same ideas and punchlines all over again. That electric cars running on energy made from coal are actually coal cars ("What are we doing? How is that better, right?" - although even an EV running 100% on coal produces less emissions than ICE car... Or that electrification is a fools errand since some things just can't be electrified- but instead of mentioning the classic hard to abate sectors like cement and steel which he mentioned in his book, he talked about how it's impossible to electrify heating as if heat pumps didn't exist. And don't get me started on him brutishly, casually, calling german people 'retarded' for doing the energiewende. All in all, his insights weren't revolutionary, stunning, impressive, thought provoking nor all that well read.
Simply put, I am not at all impressed by this person. Am I missing something?
#industry
source
Everyone apparently knows the world famous Czech energy expert Václav Smil. Renowned author and reader, Bill Gates' favourite thinker, speaker at world class conferences with decades of experience.
That track record and reputation made him quite intriguing to my eyes so I started reading and listening to him. And I have to say... I am disappointed and not impressed in the slightest.
In every speech I heard I heard the same ideas and punchlines all over again. That electric cars running on energy made from coal are actually coal cars ("What are we doing? How is that better, right?" - although even an EV running 100% on coal produces less emissions than ICE car... Or that electrification is a fools errand since some things just can't be electrified- but instead of mentioning the classic hard to abate sectors like cement and steel which he mentioned in his book, he talked about how it's impossible to electrify heating as if heat pumps didn't exist. And don't get me started on him brutishly, casually, calling german people 'retarded' for doing the energiewende. All in all, his insights weren't revolutionary, stunning, impressive, thought provoking nor all that well read.
Simply put, I am not at all impressed by this person. Am I missing something?
#industry
source
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