Can the Netherlands run entirely on sustainable energy? Many will have wondered this in recent years, perhaps also imagined what the Netherlands would look like then. In 1984 almost no one was thinking about this question. Cornelius Block does. He then wrote a book about it Unlimited shelf life – ‘sustainable’ because the term sustainability was not yet in vogue either.
“One hundred percent sustainability was really a long way off,” says Blok. “In that booklet I described a scenario for the Netherlands. We needed endless wind turbines for that, the whole country would have to be full. That appears to be much less now, but it was completely unimaginable that one turbine could generate as much energy as it can now, a hundred times more than then.”
The energy transition has occupied Blok’s entire working life. In those more than forty years, he saw the share of wind and solar energy in the world’s electricity production increase from 0.0002 percent to now 12 percent. “The curves have shot up in recent years. It is unbelievable.” But more acceleration is needed, Blok will argue on 24 May in his farewell speech as professor of energy system analysis at TU Delft.
Standard applications such as solar panels that you see now did not exist yet
Where did this early interest in the energy transition come from?
“I found the technical possibilities of sustainable energy very fascinating, thinking in terms of solutions appealed to me. My graduation research was about hydrogen storage, which is still being researched.
“It was not so much about climate then. The Club of Rome’s climate report had already come out when I went to college, but the oil crises of the 1970s were a bigger thing. Then it became tangible, came the realization that the supply of fuels was finite. It was also the time of acid rain and poor air quality. I have always found it important to take good care of the earth and creation, we must pass on the earth well.
“I ended up in a small subculture where sustainable energy was very much alive, but I was not a pioneer. They were in the generation before me. Research in this direction had already been done for about ten years, and some space had already been made at the university to work on this.”
Did you immediately see commercial opportunities?
“We recognized early on that sustainable energy was going to be important. In addition to my university work, I founded a research and consultancy agency, Ecofys, in 1984 with former fellow students. Gradually we also started developing projects and making products ourselves. Let’s just get started, we thought. It was all custom work, all standard applications such as solar panels that you see now were not there yet. For example, for a grain crusher, a muesli factory, that wanted to use solar energy to dry the grain, we devised a solar collector for the roof, after which heated air was passed through pipes to the drying process.
“The company grew rapidly, Ecofys became an advisory branch of the larger Econcern. There was a very optimistic atmosphere, we dared to think big. The fact that Econcern did not survive the financial crisis was quite a blow. I grew up on a farm, and my dad called right after bankruptcy. “It’s just behind the partial doors,” he said. Those doors separate the house from the stable. A death in the stable was bad, but not as bad as a death in the house. It was the toughest year of my life, but I immediately went into a mode of crying and carrying on. Incidentally, the Ecofys consultancy branch has always existed, which was taken over by Eneco and later by consultancy company Navigant. Among other things, we played a role in the development of European emissions trading and advised on climate negotiations.”
Hydrogen is important, but the road to scaling up is still a long one
You have been observing the energy transition for forty years and your farewell speech is titled The need for speed. Are the changes moving too slowly for you?
“It is not in my nature to be frustrated about things like slowness or loss of time. We could have started everything sooner, but things often take their time. Take green hydrogen, which is now seen as an important route. In the 1990s, voices were already raised for this, but that was much too early. Green hydrogen has only become affordable now that wind and solar energy are affordable, and that could only happen because huge amounts of money have been pumped into it by all kinds of governments for years. My point is always: you have to start where you are now.
“One of the underexposed success stories of the energy transition is that we have come a long way with efficiency requirements for everything that is newly made or built. That is fairly invisible, except when the Brexit referendum suddenly concerns requirements for vacuum cleaners. Energy use in the OECD countries is stable, despite the fact that the economies have grown. That’s an achievement.
“The message in my farewell speech is that everything that is going well must go faster, and everything that is not yet going well must also. The latest IPCC report contains a figure on how much sun and wind can contribute, but to get there, growth has to be three times faster than it is now. Meanwhile, the fuel side also needs to be addressed. Hydrogen is important, but the road to scaling up is still a long one. In the meantime, biofuels and CO capture and storage are2 necessary, but its growth is too slow. The more different things you use, the faster your reduction will be.”
Now it is a huge world, I can see that just by the people I trained myself and whom I now meet again
The IPCC is an important resource for policy makers. You were one of the main authors for many years, what was your role there?
“I joined the report that came out in 2001. Then I had registered myself, I was asked for the last report. I have a broad view of everything that has to do with mitigation: what contributes when, how much and at what cost? I retrieved information on industry, agriculture and transport.
“I was very honored to do it, it is a great pleasure to work with so many smart people. Although it is also difficult to work because you get endless comments. If there’s one thing I’d love to keep doing, it’s this, but I don’t know if there’s an age limit. By the way, there are a lot of gifted young people who can do it too.”
Are you hopeful about the energy transition?
“There was a time when I came to the national wind energy conference, and I knew everyone. We did what we could, but it was a small world. Now it is a huge world, I can see that just by the people I trained myself and whom I now meet again. Ultimately, it has to come from intellectual capacity. It is encouraging that so many people are now working on it.”