Stanford prof says California can exit fossil fuels by 2050, and create 220,000 jobs in the process
In California, Stanford engineering professor Mark Jacobsen, writing in Energy, says that the state of California could completely abandon fossil fuels by 2050 with dedicated development of its solar, wind, tidal, wave, geothermal resources and changed over to hydrogen fuel cell and electric vehicles. The plan is not entirely dissimilar from many of the goals established by IATA for aviation — with a starting point in 2020 that 100% new energy generation would be renewable, a conversion of 80-85 percent of energy generation to clean sources by 2035, with the remainder switching over by 2050.
Back in 2009, Jacobsen, also writing in Energy, described a plant o install 4 million wind turbines, more than 2 billion rooftop solar PV and other renewable technologies to eliminate all fossil fuels. Jacobsen said the switch over was technically and economically feasible, but needed more political and social support.
Jacobsen said that “a complete conversion in California by 2050 is estimated to create ∼220,000 more 40-year jobs than lost, eliminate ∼12,500 (3800–23,200) state air-pollution premature mortalities/yr, avoid $103 (31–232) billion/yr in health costs, representing 4.9 (1.5–11.2)% of California’s 2012 gross domestic product, and reduce California’s 2050 global climate cost contribution by $48 billion/yr.”
Category: Fuels
