Energize!

 I like the way Yglesias frames the climate debate here. We could basically solve the climate crisis with abundant-to-the-point-of-being-free electricity. If electricity was basically free, we could desalinate water, capture carbon from the air and produce hydrogen - all outputs that Yglesias mentions. 

If we are going to stop and reduce global warming, it really seems like carbon capture is going to figure prominently in that solution. Some climate activists are wedded to conservation as a form of personal virtue, and allowing people to simply capture the carbon in the atmosphere reduces the need to conserve. The real impediment to carbon capture is the energy cost. The same goes for cheap, abundant hydrogen. Yglesias' broader point - which is really important - is that if we produced massive amounts of electricity we could have better outcomes and not disrupt everyone's lives too much.

What Yglesias references briefly but doesn't commit to is nuclear power. Germany, who has done great work on renewables, is shuttering its nuclear power plants. That's a "scarcity model" that is precisely backwards. Renewables might replace nuclear power in terms of gigawatts, but why wouldn't you want to have massive additional gigawatts? 

The point of any energy policy should not be to replace carbon fuels with clean energy but to exceed that quantity.

I don't think we can wait on the fusion power miracle. We need more nuclear power plants. Today.