We have yet to come to terms with the idea that carbon energy is the answer and not the problem. There is zero problem with carbon emissions. Carbon emissions are the byproduct of life both in nature and the human world. Carbon fuel is amazing, it is the only source of storing and subsequently burning energy whose byproducts nature knows exactly how to recycle.

The problem is in the word "recycle" as in circular. At present nature is pretty good at recycling its CO2, but man tends to treat carbon fuels as linear, we extract and burn them faster than we replenish them.

We even have the technology to replenish them and Mother Nature is more than willing to "kick in" and help. We have created enormous demand for carbon fuels, so much so that we are burning carbon fuels from the past (fossil fuels) and not just carbon fuels from the present like wood, food, etc.

The problem is "burning" carbon fuels stored in the ground in the distant past is cheaper than producing new carbon fuels. But as technology improves and the supply of stored carbon fuels in the ground diminishes, we will eventually get on track producing as much carbon fuel as we consume, and the "cycle" will be back in balance.

In the meantime, the pursuit of replacing carbon fuel with alternative fuel sources consumes far more attention and in the long run will likely turn out to be far less efficient.

I am not against these alternatives, but they are expensive. Whether you are talking solar, wind, or nuclear. I power my house and cars with solar, the cost to produce energy is almost 6 times higher than the cost of producing energy with coal. The saving grace is that producing it on my roof, allows me to bypass the cost of the grid and so my solar powered electricity is cheaper than coal power electricity, but only because there are no distribution costs. So as a "local application" solar makes sense, but as a means to power the grid, it will be hugely expensive. And produce tons of environmental waste we don't know fully how to recycle yet.

Nuclear and wind both have environmental waste issues and wind has the added problem of being undependable.

So where does that leave us... first and foremost in order to keep raising standards of living we should do nothing to stop CO2 emissions, cheap abundant energy is the single most important factor that contributes to higher standards of living.

But those efforts must be matched with an equal effort to increase the amount of CO2 being consumed to produce energy, ideally, we might even produce a surplus we can return to the ground for future generations. In other words, the goal should be to make the "energy cycle" balance not to make it smaller.