Building a Net Zero World

The replacement from fossil fuels will come from renewable energies, led by wind and solar, accompanied by hydroelectric power. In addition, new synthetic fuels are emerging and progress is being made in the alternative of green hydrogen as an energy vector where electricity grids do not reach – mainly in the transport sector. In addition, innovations in nuclear fission appear to increase safety and availability and reduce contaminants and the promising nuclear fusion is consolidated, a practically inexhaustible and clean source of energy.

There must be a shift from the fossil fuel economy – materials economy – to the renewable energy economy – knowledge economy, ideas and technological innovation economy. This shift will lead to smarter solutions, higher productivity , and more efficient use of abundant resources .

Net Zero – carbon neutrality – will be achieved by combining two technological areas: 1) innovation in clean energy, with new materials, new fuels such as biogas or synthetic gasoline and new forms of storage and 2) technologies to capture, reuse and store carbon (CCUS). Both areas could converge for the production of synthetic fuels from green hydrogen and captured_CO2 .

In parallel, greater energy efficiency will be achieved through innovations in artificial intelligence and the Internet of Things.

All these areas could be accelerated by quantum computing, due to its enormous power performing simulations.

To achieve Net Zero, the collaboration of all social agents is necessary, from academics to entrepreneurs, from citizens to actors in the rural world and investors. The way to involve citizens in this collaboration is education and communication: citizens must perceive climate change as something imminent and at the same time, avoidable. And that they perceive that their particular and group actions are effective for this.