The IEA states that:
In 2024, 80% of the growth in global electricity generation was provided by renewable sources and nuclear power. Together, they contributed 40% of total generation for the first time, with renewables alone supplying 32%.
So 32% of new electricity generation in 2024 was provided by renewables. In 2023 renewables accounted for about 23% of electricity generation, and 13% of total energy consumption.
I commented this in a related post, but according to the IEA, in 2024 renewables accounted for 38% of new energy generation, and 32% of new electricity generation. That's a big discrepancy from the 90% cited in this report, which refers to "renewable power capacity,"defined as:
the maximum net generating capacity of power plants and other installations that use renewable energy sources to produce electricity.
Not quite sure why that difference in definition leads to such different figures.
For me, this is the key paragraph:
Few outsiders have gotten a glimpse of Stardust’s plans, and the company has not publicly released details about its technology, its business model, or exactly who works at its company. But the company appears to be positioning itself to develop and sell a proprietary geoengineering technology to governments that are considering making modifications to the global climate—acting like a kind of defense contractor for climate alteration.
If the past year has taught us anything, it's that we don't want to become more beholden to private capital for critical societal needs, and a stable atmosphere is at the absolute bottom of the pyramid. Dave Karpf has a great take on the geoengineering situation, so I'll let his words take it from here:
First, we have to believe that the science of geoengineering is rock-solid. Second, we have to believe the science of real-time climate modeling and forecasting has been basically perfected. You need your climate models to be extremely good in order to forecast what the effects of geoengineering will be. And you need the geoengineering not to have any surprising downstream consequences that the engineers couldn’t predict. You particularly need this because “termination shock” is itself a warning – once you start this process at scale, you cannot end it without disastrous consequences. You had better be right.
Geoengineering would absolutely be a minefield of unintended consequences. It has never been attempted before. We are incapable of testing it at scale without, y’know, actually pulling the trigger and trying. The degree to which we just don’t fucking know what the unintended impacts of geoengineering would be is off the charts here. The models are based on two major volcanic eruptions, with limited contemporaneous data collection. We’re starting from an N of TWO! Model it all you want, but those models will be based on assumptions that can only be refined once we’ve pulled the trigger on the giant silver bullets.
Water is essential to human survival, so I would consider that a primary problem. Trace pharmaceuticals in drinking water aren't great, but I would consider that a secondary (or even tertiary) problem, and a solvable one at that.
To start, the vast majority of water use is agricultural (nearly 90% in Colorado, for example), and soil & plants provide 2 more layers of biofilters for any contaminants that might remain. This paper delves into that, although from the cursory glance I gave it's not clear whether the concentrations are anywhere near an effective dose. My guess is no:
If recycled water was used purely for agriculture (drawing on watersheds & aquifers for drinking water), I imagine that would solve the scarcity issue while further diluting pharmaceutical contamination. When it comes to recycling drinking water, Harvard Health Publishing says that not much research has been done in this area, and I do think that's important to look into if (when?) water recycling becomes more of a necessity.