Today we're talking about the environment, and not in the, oh my god, we're all gonna die sort of way. But instead the, hey, there's actually some hope direction. Famously terrified politician Al Gore just wrote an op-ed in the New York Times that, well, got completely ignored by everybody despite the fact that it was super encouraging. I mean, sure, the US probably isn't getting a passing grade in environmentalism right now, but his op-ed reads like a teacher saying, hey, you've got a lot of potential. If you even applied yourself a little bit, we could get you over that hump. So let's get into maybe the least terrifying climate change YouTube video you're ever gonna see. And for my Republican viewers who weren't scared off by the incredibly large picture of Al Gore on the logo of this video, capitalism in the free marketplace surprisingly large role in his vision. Entrieged, well then pull up a chair, get comfy and stay awhile. The first thing he points out is, in 2014, electricity from solar and wind was cheaper than new coal and gas plants in probably 1% of the world. Today, only five years later, solar and wind provide the cheapest source of electricity in two thirds of the world. Within five more years, those sources are expected to provide the cheapest new electricity in the entire world. Of course, when faced with the question of whether to continue to operate a coal plant versus build a new solar plant, well, you're gonna keep burning coal. If on the other hand, your choice was between building a new coal plant or building a new solar power or wind power plant, well, then you might end up with statistics like last year, solar and wind represented 88% of the new electricity capacity installed in the 28 nations of the European Union. 65% in India, 53% in China, and 49% in the United States. That's half. Now you might be wondering why it's so low in the United States. Oh, it's because of reports like... The operators of coal and nuclear power plants got a boost from the Trump administration this week. The president ordered energy secretary Rick Perry to, quote, prepare immediate steps on, quote, to stop the often unprofitable plants from shutting down. Yeah, it turns out not everybody in this country is a fan of free market economics. And this administration has been using emergency section 202 powers to force grid operators to buy coal-powered a premium to keep those plants open. Sorry about that. We seem to have taken a slight detour down negative alley. Let's get back into optimist lane here. The worry that immediately went through your head was probably jobs. I mean, think about the miners. No, not them. Well, fortunately, can you guess what the two highest-growing jobs in America were last year? According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the job that grew the most last year out of all jobs was solar and stars. Also, see if you can spot a pattern here. The second fastest growing job in America was wind turbine service technicians. Connect the dots in that pattern. Unfortunately, these jobs are only accessible to areas of America where the wind blows and the sun shines. I will say wind power does seem to be a little more equitable for Midwesterners and coal country, for what it's worth. Probably not much. Now this brings us to another good or alarming pattern depending on who you ask. This year several American utilities have announced plants to close existing natural gas and coal generating plants. Some decades of useful life remaining to replace their output with cheaper electricity from wind and solar farms. Connected to even cheaper battery storage. I mean, I'm not sure how many different ways I can report this, but renewable energy is just kind of really cheap now in this country. To quote the CEO of Northern Indiana Public Service Company, one of the companies that recently made the leap, the surprise was how dramatically the renewables and storage proposals beat natural gas. I could not have predicted this five years ago. And this is all happening with the federal government actively fighting against the free markets to hamper this inexpensive alternative. Now of course this episode isn't just about renewable energy, and as private industry is also leading to some other huge changes in the fight against man-made climate change. Take for example this Bloomberg report from 2016. In the next few years Tesla, Nissan and Chevy plan to start selling long range electric cars in the $30,000 range. And other car makers and tech companies are investing billions on dozens of new models do out in the next four years. By 2020 some of these will be faster, safer, cheaper and more convenient than their gasoline counterparts. And what do you know since that report came out, the number of electric vehicles on the road has increased by 450% in the past four years. This is based on improvements in the technology and lowering of costs. Which again, this stuff isn't rocket science. Better and cheaper stuff sells well. This is the stuff your Econ 101 teacher expects you to know before you even start the class. Several automobile manufacturers are shifting research and development spending away from internal combustion engines. Because the cost reduction curve for the EVs is expected to soon drop the cost of the vehicle well below comparable gasoline and diesel models. I mean it's clearly still not great market in America because the last time I saw an electric car on the road probably had a freshly applied Hillary 2016 bumper sticker on it. But the technologies are picking up steam and these car sales are blowing up and not in the Samsung Note 7 sort of way in China. That's right China. A country where each city has a distinct flavor. Hmm, I'm detecting hints of copper in the air. We must be in Beijing. Oh yeah, and China is also implementing established technologies to convert half of the world's municipal buses to electric buses. Quick disclaimer though, by 2025 the country will account for 99% of the world's battery-powered buses. So yeah, the US and the rest of the world are a little bit irrelevant from this accomplishment. So now to the final piece of this conversation. Why did we have this conversation? Did Al Gore and by proxy me choose to talk about this to take a victory lap on the issue? Get ready to fly the mission accomplished banner, boys. No instead environmental conversations are generally framed like, on a scale from water world to the actual rapture, how screwed is humanity going to be in three years? That inspires me to invest my money in wilderness survival gear, find a creek and thank god for my years as a boys' goat. Instead I want to say that, hey, if we actually want to fight this issue to either end independence on Middle Eastern oil or fight climate change, America has an amazing arsenal of weapons to attack this issue. The technology is here and the prices are right, to the point where they'd be winning in an exclusively free market. At this point it's less sending a man to the moon and more like Eisenhower's incredibly mundane creation of the national system with interstate highways. How is a skippable day in my history glass? Of course we have a lot more riding on this one. So the question becomes, are we going to invest in integrating cheaper, efficient tech into the grid quicker? In the end there are plenty of reasons to be worried, but at the same time there aren't many reasons to be hopeless. Somehow even with an active antagonization of the renewable energy industry and electric vehicles they have managed to make huge strides through sheer free market forces. There's work to be done, but if we want to do it we already have the weapons at the right prices to fight the war. Thank you and that's all I have to say about that. Hello YouTube, if you want to support independent nonpartisan news remember to subscribe by clicking on this floating logo to the right of my head. Ring that bell so that freedom will continue to ring and give me a thumbs up if you like what you saw. Lastly, as always thank you for watching.