11 Oct 2021
Dr. Kenny Siu’s Sharing on Sing Pao Column – Carbon Emissions – Clean Energy
People may not realize a temperature drop of two or three degrees Celsius. For the earth, a drop in temperature will wipe out many plants and animals. Back to the Mesozoic Era, the average temperature of the earth was about 4 degrees Celsius higher than it is now and the Arctic Circle was where crocodiles lived. However, the earth’s average temperature was 6 degrees Celsius lower than it is now during the Ice Ages.
The year 1850 was the turning point of our globe. Huge amount of fossil fuels was used for electricity generation. Today, almost 51 billion tons of greenhouse gases are released to the atmosphere every year, making the earth temperature increase by 1.3 degrees Celsius. Such temperature increase will possibly lead to extinction of many species.
Adoption of clean energy will become inevitable as a replacement of fossil fuels in tackling the issue, but the stability of renewable energy is dependent on weather and extra cost is required for securing the power supply. Therefore, investment in battery and transmission grid will be of significance in our way to get rid of fossil fuels.