Newsletter 12: Global Finance and Insurance Companies Move Away from Coal; Hydrogen As a Tool for Decarbonization
Let’s Talk Financial Flows and Simple Gases
Since we've all got a bit of newfound downtime...
Seriously, dear readers, what the heck has happened since we last caught up in 2019? Remember everyone saying, “gosh, 2019 stunk, I hope 2020 is better.” Umm, things have most decidedly not gotten better! The last few months have been downright frothy. #covid19 #washyourhands, #twodollargas, #sxswcancelled, and my new favorite: #whatjusthappenedtomy401k? But this newsletter is about looking past the short-term stuff and focusing on the longer-term trends. If you're trying to work from home right now, let this be a little break from your push notifications.
Since we last caught up at the dawn of time, I have been releasing a surprisingly well-received weekly ‘3 x 3’ video series on LinkedIn to encapsulate the need-to-know events of the week in three minutes. I even launched a YouTube channel where those videos will land. If we’re gonna be socially distanced for a while, it’s time to kick my digital presence up a notch and leverage some interwebz wizardry! Heads up- PKD is also a kidney disease, so there are some other PKD videos you might find near that link that are clearly unrelated...
I’m happy to also share I’ve crossed something off my bucket list. I signed a book contract with Prometheus Books to write a great American novel! What I haven’t yet crossed off that bucket list is actually writing the 350-page manuscript, which must be delivered by mid-August of this year. With multiple canceled speaking engagements, now I may actually have the time to get it done.
The book will include charts, graphs and I hope some random doodles to make sure readers are paying attention. It will mostly be about the story of you and what you do, as the world races to create a new and cleaner energy economy. I’m calling it The Energy Switch - available in Spring 2021.
I hear your rousing ovation from here (actually, 37,000 people viewed the announcement on LinkedIn). But seriously, this thing has basically taken over my life and home quickly. It is fair to say it has consumed most of my waking moments in recent months. How does one cover the whole energy and grid ecosystem in 350 pages? What had previously been an idle threat, has now become a very real (and exciting) thing. Writing the book has given me access to incredible people and stories all across the world - more on this below!
These days, the ‘ButWhyPKD?’ newsletter is a passion project, and in order to get it done I have to steal away moments to tackle it. There has certainly been a lot going on in the energy world since my last issue (COVID-19, wildfires in Australia, Tesla, Tesla, Tesla, state-level legislative and regulatory movement) but staying true to why I began writing this in the first place, let's explore two topics that are really important signals of bigger change afoot: Hydrogen is for real this time and coal power plants are struggling to even secure underwriting.
Bright Idea
Starving the beast
Hydrocarbons cannot survive without capital investment and insurance and money is finally beginning to flee the sector. Underwriter refusals. The hallowed halls of large financial institutions and insurance providers are not festooned with “Bernie for President” stickers and yard-signs. Yet big money - an increasing amount now well into the trillions - is simply refusing to underwrite new coal plants.
This shift in thinking from the financial and insurance industries is best reflected in Blackrock’s CEO LARRY FINK’s lead, though the groundswell started well before. In January 2020, Fink wrote an open letter to the markets saying in effect, ‘the way we do business is changing’, and it was because of the real liability related to climate change. An increasing number of these entities are refusing to even companies that earn a substantial portion of their revenues from coal. Wow. Logic progression leads me to surmise that the natural gas sector will be next to feel the crosshairs, with an initial focus on flaring and leaks known as “fugitive emissions.” If I ever start a rock group, I already have the name.
One of my absolute favorite daily (and free) emails comes near the end of each day from the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA). The institute focuses on financial flows and lately it seems that every few days it has yet another story about a financial institution – either a bank or an insurance company migrating away from carbon.
I started seeing a lot of these in mid-December, so I decided to gather two week’s worth to get a sense of the Market’s long-term perspective of coal and dirty hydrocarbons and their associated electrons. Here we go:
Dec 16: Goldman Sachs updates its policies to discontinue financing for new coal mines and upstream Arctic oil exploration, while looking to spend $750 billion in ten years for “Climate transition and inclusive growth finance.”
Dec 16: Liberty Mutual to stop underwriting companies making over 25% of their profit from extraction of coal or burning it for energy, with existing investments and coverage to be discontinued by 2023 (it also announced its first Chief Sustainability Officer). This one was big news because the Emu has been among the larger insurers of fossil fuel companies. According to Insure Our Future, a group specifically pressuring this industry to move away from underwriting fossil, the 40 biggest U.S. insurance companies hold over $450 bn in “coal, oil, gas, and electric utility stocks and bonds.” As they move, so does the energy world.
Dec 17: Standard Charter Bank pulled out of three coal-fired generation projects in Southeast Asia, while announcing it would only support clients actively transitioning business to generate less than 10% of earnings from thermal coal over the next decade. A year ago it had announced it would no longer fund new projects but had continued on with some already in the works. Finally, it indicated it would increase targets for clean energy funding to $35 bn over the next five years.
Dec 23: The Hartford announced it will stop insuring or investing in companies generating over 25% of revenues from thermal coal mining or generating over 25% of their electricity from coal. The insurance giant also announced it would apply a similar policy to companies involved in tar sand oil extraction. Chairman and CEO, Christopher Swift commented, “Extreme weather affects people’s lives and businesses – and the risks are getting worse. As an insurer and asset manager we recognize the growing cost of this crisis, and we’re determined to use our resources and influence to address the challenge. That’s why we have taken a position on coal and tar sands.”
The situation kinda reminds me of this picture. They wait for one to jump and then all the others follow in quick succession. Suddenly, splash!! Or bellyflop... and a new norm is established.
All of these recent announcements suggest a growing trend, in which many insurers and financiers bow to the ineluctable climate dynamic. Indeed, a group of 130 global financial entities with $47 trillion in assets agreed last September to align business activities with the struggle to address climate change, committing to the United Nations’ Principles for Responsible Banking (PRB).
And then there was the Fink BlackRock I mentioned previously, his annual missive on corporate governance, entitled A Fundamental Reshaping of Finance. If you haven’t read it, don’t waste any more time here - go look it up right now. Here are his key points (in case you are still here):
“The evidence on climate risk is compelling investors to reassess core assumptions about modern finance… Investors are increasingly reckoning with these questions and recognizing that climate risk is investment risk. Indeed, climate change is almost invariably the top issue that clients around the world raise with BlackRock.”
“These questions are driving a profound reassessment of risk and asset values. And because capital markets pull future risk forward, we will see changes in capital allocation more quickly than we see changes to the climate itself. In the near future – and sooner than most anticipate – there will be a significant reallocation of capital.” That is his emphasis, not mine by the way. Fink and I seem to agree because that indeed has been the major thesis of ButWhyPKD? since its outset...
This trend falls in line with what I’ve considered the foundational elements of the energy transition since the mid-2000s. The often discussed ‘Three Ds’: decarbonization, digitalization, and decentralization.
The lurches we’ve seen so far are nothing compared to the unfathomable change that is coming. And when it comes, it’ll feel like a rapid phase change - apparently coming out of nowhere, when in fact the elements have been coalescing for a long time.
Meanwhile at the Trump Administration...
But its not all promising on the financial front. There are some significant hold-outs who don’t share the investment thesis offered by Fink (for now): Seven of the ten largest banks chose not to participate (Citigroup Inc., Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group and Industrial and Commercial Bank of China were the three that did sign on). Goldman Sachs did not put pen to paper, but has said it will continue to engage in such efforts (as evidenced by the first headline, above). Bank of America Wells Fargo indicated it was working towards goals it had independently set, while JPMorgan Chase & Co., and Morgan Stanley took a hard pass.
This is the ultimate version of “testing an investment thesis”... on both sides.
Others can’t help themselves as market animals and so they still hedge. They will eventually come around. They just don’t know it yet.
Bank of America’s Wealth Management Group also signed the PRB, but the larger corporation has a much more tepid stance towards the phase-out of coal, stating in its policy, “Going forward, Bank of America will maintain a reduced level of credit exposure to coal extraction companies.” Yeah, not much to get excited about there.
Still, those that “know what’s up” are finally doing something about it. It all feels like this tension in the market will only accelerate things in short order. The bloodbath in the oil and gas sector driven by the testosterone-fueled spat between Russian and Saudia Arabia certainly highlights the capital at risk in that sector. If an increasing number of financial firms simply move away from the sector, at a minimum, investments eventually become cost-prohibitive and leave no path forward for the coal sector.
The industrial revolution was perhaps the largest single occurence that transformed civilization and changed the trajectory of humanity (OK, maybe the printing press or advent of software or sliced white bread). Now, we embark on a multi-trillion dollar transition to something new, cleaner, and better. Radical change inevitably brings winners and losers. Those who seize the reins will see remarkable success, while those who fail to grasp that essence risk vaporizing enormous amounts of wealth. Bye Peabody Coal, Bye Chesapeake Energy. Who’s next?
Lighting the Torch
Don’t look now, but the hydrogen economy may actually be coming
You either have to take the carbon out on the front end or the back end. Green hydrogen is all about addressing the front end.
OK, as an admitted energy buff (you do read my newsletter after all), sooner or later you knew it was inevitable that we would talk hydrogen, and that we would go down the H2 rabbit hole. This is a complex topic: the more I learn, the more I realize I have a lot more to learn. A conversation with some experts for my book this month was ample proof of that. Now into the wormhole.
An entirely new concept in power generation...
Over the last couple of months, some data points have begun to suggest that hydrogen may not be like fusion - that is, “the tech of tomorrow that always will be,” but rather a new potential solution with legs. Consider a recent headline out of California that the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP) plans on bringing a new power plant online in 2025, commencing its burn with a 30% renewable hydrogen/70% natural gas mix, and going to 100% H2 by 2045 when California has committed to a fully decarbonized grid. That has never been contemplated before. “Renewable” means that the H2 will have to be created from renewable resources, since in essence H2 is really a medium for storing energy derived elsewhere.
Where to get the clean H2?
So how might a power plant such as LADWP’s be fueled? Well, in the case of California, the green hydrogen might come from super cheap solar plants in the desert (the latest contract to LADWP from 8 minute solar comes in at below $20/MWh), or from offshore wind when the industry finally hits the West Coast (we’ll have to wait for floating wind in order for offshore wind to reach California, although the first 25 MW project is already connected in Europe).
More broadly, that low-cost renewable energy can come from a host of renewable projects around the world. For example in August, Orsted, the world’s largest offshore wind developer, announced a project – funded to date with half a million dollars from the UK – to showcase the ability to deliver low-cost and green H2 from offshore wind facilities. The ‘Gigastack project’ (I blame Musk for everything ‘giga’ these days, except my giga-salary) is focused on reducing the cost of electrolyzers (the technology that turns water into H2 and O – remember that experiment in high school science?) These 5 MW units would be stacked in large installations to “exploit synergies.” In December, Orsted announced an additional initiative to build a 2 MW (small, but it’s a start) electrolysis plant near Copenhagen that is connected to a pair of offshore turbines. The plant would yield 600 kilograms of green H2 per day, enough to fuel 20-30 buses as well as a small number of trucks and taxis.
Massive solar arrays and wind turbines paired with electrolyzers could also do the trick. Siemens announced last October that it was eyeing a huge green energy project – up to 5 gigawatts – in concert with Hydrogen Renewables Australia (using Siemens electrolyzers). The project would be developed in stages, with a demo phase using H2 for transportation, an expansion to blend H2 with natural gas, and a larger phase to export H2 to Asian markets, specifically Japan and South Korea. This concept joins an additional gigantic project proposed by Vestas, MacQuarie and others to create a 15 GW Asian Renewable Energy Hub, to create hydrogen projects (as well as exporting electricity via massive sub-sea power cables to Southeast Asia).
Meanwhile, Engie and Air Liquide last November announced a partnership to launch the HyGreen Provence project aimed at annual production of 1,300 GWh of solar energy and 10,440 tons of green hydrogen by 2027, with the H2 to be stored in underground salt caverns in southeastern France. The first hydrogen is expected to be produced by the end of next year. Engie is also sponsoring the first hydrogen powered ship, a zero emissions catamaran that has been making its way around the world on a 6-year voyage to demonstrate the potential of hydrogen to power the global shipping industry.
So the first real investments are being made, and some huge projects are being conceptualized. Consulting firm Wood MacKenzie estimates that $365 is already invested in green hydrogen, with another $3.5 billion of projects in the development pipeline, with a large portion of that in Asia.
Aaaaaaaaaaand that wormhole just gets deeper...
Lighting the torch for new applications
Many of the really big projects are out there on the horizon with time-frames around 2030. Closer to today, H2 will gain additional visibility with the Tokyo Olympics, (or maybe H2 yields temporarily to COVID-19) where the Olympic flame is planned to be hydrogen, and 100 hydrogen buses will be (hopefully) schlepping passengers to and fro. (Not everybody is a fan. Tesla’s Elon Musk has called fuel cell tech inefficient and expensive and H2 fuel cells “mind-boggingly stupid.” – how does he really feel? But, I don’t doubt his vibe, and the boy thinks he can sing! – seriously, you gotta check the link out. He’s one unusual cat.)
Beyond power and fuel-cell driven cars, trucks, trains and ships, there are also potential applications for H2 in the industrial sector – an area to date that has been exceedingly difficult to decarbonize. For example, German industrial powerhouse ThyssenKrupp announced last November that it had tested the use of hydrogen in a blast furnace. In its press release TK commented that a typical process uses 300 kilograms (kg) of coke and 200 kg of pulverized coal for a ton of pig iron. The coal is injected through 28 ‘tuyeres’ (ports), but in one the test, H2 was used in a single tuyere to replace coal. The long term goal is to supplant coal in all 28 injection sites in the initial test furnace by 2022, and then to extend that process to other blast furnaces, releasing water vapor in place of CO2. Long-term, ThyssenKrupp plans to be carbon neutral by 2050. Meanwhile, Siemens is building a 2.2 MW electrolysis plant fueled by wind turbines that will ultimately be used to create hydrogen for steelmaking.
The Path to an H2 economy
But how do we get there? The Hydrogen Council released a report in late January highlighting potential paths to a competitive hydrogen scenario, and indicated that the real key to this is the same dynamic that drives the tremendous historic progress in battery and solar module cost reductions: sheer volume. It is estimated that increasing the numbers of fuel cells from 10,000 to 200,00 annual units would reduce costs by up to 45%, while their stated goal of scaling electrolysis facilities up to 70 GW(!) could cut costs of electrolyzers to where they need to be in order to be cost-competitive.
The Council notes that 18 governments (with economies representing 70% of global GDP) have developed detailed hydrogen strategies, such as total worldwide sales of 10 million fuel cell vehicles by 2030 and plans to develop 10,000 fueling stations by 2030. The Council also designates some industries as being competitive for H2 by the end of this decade, including rail transport and long-haul trucking
The other big draw of hydrogen is that it can help decarbonize sectors that have until now been relatively immutable to change – largely because they don’t use electricity directly in their processes. These include industrial heating and industry feedstocks.
There are issues along the entire hydrogen change, from production, to transportation and storage, and finally to end use. In this letter, we will focus on production (downstream, there are a host of issues to consider - too numerous for this already-lengthy treatise). Today, the world already has a sizable hydrogen economy, and consumes 55 metric tons in the industrial sector, primarily for activities such as petroleum refining, treating of metals, fertilizer production, and food processing.
95% of the hydrogen consumed today is derived from fossil fuels, and is known as ‘grey hydrogen’ with resulting emissions of between nine to 12 tons of CO2 for every ton of H2 created. The majority of H2 today is created through a process called reforming/gasification, in which ‘synthesis gas’ – a mixture of hydrogen, carbon monoxide, and some small amounts of CO2 - is produced by applying high temperature steam to natural gas. The CO2 is reacted with water, with H2 being the end result. One can also use coal and steam in a similar process referred to as gasification. The goal is to both shift that to a lower carbon approach, while also boosting overall use of H2.
In addition to the electrolysis approach which separates water into H2 and oxygen, one can also capture and store hydrogen from reforming and gasification (known as carbon capture and storage – CCS – or ‘blue hydrogen’) or use pyrolysis to heat natural gas in an oxygen-free environment, resulting in a solid carbon by-product. All three technologies are expensive today, so the goal is to identify which of these is the most promising path forward. Given the large amounts of renewables coming online – with continuously falling costs – the focus on green hydrogen is growing, but blue hydrogen may be cheaper in the short run, in large part owing to the current high costs of electrolysis.
Nonetheless, some analysts are very optimistic about the long-term prospects for storage, and BloombergNEF suggests that the costs may fall by as much as 80% over the coming decade. Its analysis foresees green hydrogen coming in at a cost as low as $1.40/kg by 2030 (compared with a range of $2.50 to $6.80 today), and falling further to $.80 over 40 years. Four decades is a long time over which to conjecture, particularly given the pace at which technologies continue to evolve.
Time for some back-of-the-envelope-math here...
Even at $.80, though, that translates into a natural gas price of roughly $6.00 per MMBtu, compared to today’s prompt month price hovering around $2.00. So if those numbers are right, absent some kind of carbon pricing, that’s still a heavy lift.
At the same time, Wood Mackenzie indicates that if renewable energy costs can fall to $30/MWh, green hydrogen can achieve cost parity with grey hydrogen, which would help it establish a foothold in the existing hydrogen economy. Its recent report counts over 250 MW of green electrolysis projects worldwide at the end of last year, growing to 3,200 MW within five years (largely due to investments from Japan and South Korea).
Downstream, there are significant issues to address relating to infrastructure and service to various sectors of the economy. Hydrogen must be stored – either in liquid form or as a compressed gas, both of which involve both infrastructure and energy.
Transportation may take several forms, including shipping in specially designed vessels, as well as in new pipelines, or existing pipelines adapted to transport H2. A recent study conducted by European utilities highlighted the need to integrate the electric, gas, and hydrogen infrastructures, and suggested that in Europe, a hydrogen grid would need to be created re-using the existing natural gas infrastructure. There’s a lot to discuss in this area – a topic for another day.
What’s clear though, is that as the costs of renewables fall and the carbon management imperative grows, this area is gaining an increasing amount of attention. The space will be worth watching to see whether and how quickly today’s announcements translate into tomorrow’s steel in the ground.
Hindenburg Schmindenburg?
However, there are some more skeptical views on the topic. Some respected experts I spoke to recently indicated that the burning of H2 in a combustion turbine is indeed feasible, but the costs of production are very prohibitive. First, to get the amount of renewable electricity needed to fuel the LADWP plant with hydrogen, one would need a huge amount of solar or wind capacity. Then the cost would be on the order of $20 per MMBTU, compared with less than $2 today for natural gas. A statistic offered was that a 1,000 MW gas turbine would burn three space shuttle’s worth of H2 every day. Then there are some other critical issues simply relating to the properties of hydrogen. One is flame speed. That’s the measure rate of expansion of the flame in a combustion reaction. Hydrogen moves! And that increases the risk of the flame moving back into the pipeline or source. Another the fact that it burns hotter, so thermal management becomes more of a challenge. And finally, there’s its unpleasant characteristic of having a very high upper flammability limit, at 75% vs 17% for methane. That simply means that if you have a methane concentration richer than 17%, it can’t catch fire if near an ignition source. H2, concentrations by contrast, can reach 75%. That makes it less stable and prone to explosion. That’s not to say that it cannot be managed, but the technical challenges and risks are somewhat higher.
So… that’s my tl;dr on hydrogen. What’s your take on hydrogen? Email me at butwhypkd@gmail.com #H2yea-or-nah?
Where In the World is PKD?
The man behind the voice
The fall and winter provided yet another example of how not to manage my carbon footprint (though I have been buying offsets for at least some of my trips), I offered a few more of my 12-hour death march workshops on batteries. And yet, like the damn Light Brigade, more brave souls show up!
One on a lake just outside Las Vegas – it’s not a place I think of as ‘Water Country,’ but I had a water view out my window, and another in Nashville. Also got to central Minnesota to keynote the annual meeting of CMPAS (an association of municipals in Minnesota). The countryside was beautiful with lots of lakes and although it was October and windy, I was seriously daydreaming about swimming. Then there was one recently for staff at the New York Power Association, where I got to see their central nervous system. Did you know the water levels in the Great Lakes doesn’t make itself known to NY’s hydro system for as much as two years later? So the elevated water in Lake Michigan translates into more energy in 2022 (hmm - wonder how I can bet on that near-certainty?)
Keynoted at American Public Power Association’s Customer Connections Conference in New Orleans. It was chock full of dedicated municipal utility workers, many of whom have served their communities for three decades or more. I was super impressed with their dedication. The thing I remember most is that I had been short of breath the day prior in NOLA (no drinking to speak of). When my name got called to speak, I was so lightheaded I wasn’t sure I would make the stage or finish my speech. But I thought, ‘Well, I’ll either stand up and make it through or I won’t.’ The speech went pretty well (I think).
So a trip to the emergency room led to me getting a transfusion of two units of blood plus a bunch of procedures (since I have started this newsletter two years or so ago, I’ve seen far too many days in hospitals - you guys are killing me!)
Those medical issues grounded me – no flying for a month due to severe anemia (I’m now a huge fan of hemoglobin and hematocrits, or H&Hs, to those in the know). This was bad news as I had a 3.5-hour workshop at Energy Storage North America (ESNA) in San Diego, a 2-hour market summary at the Texas Renewable Energy Industries Association GridNEXT in Houston, and a 10-minute keynote for a Smart Electric Power Alliance (SEPA) gathering at the NARUC (utility commissioners) conference in San Antonio coming up.
Enter modern technology: With the help of the fantastic staff at ESNA, I called in remotely and narrated my 100+ slides from afar. That worked out better than I had hoped, and one attendee who emailed me for my slides thanked me for “an energetic and educational session” (who needs hemoglobin?) Then the folks at TREIA suggested I simply narrate my slides in advance for the GridNEXT conference. Turns out there is a feature in PPT that lets you record narration to accompany each slide. So that event took place without me even being connected, (and I got a standing ovation for the first time in my life - ah, the pity vote. That reaction also tells me that the content is good, but my personal presence may be overrated).
Gather 'round the Watercooler
The hot gossip
At a recent SEPA event I was asked to be deliberately provocative in order to stimulate the conversation with an audience that included regulators. So I commented. A seasoned veteran in the regulatory world emailed me shortly after with the following comment. “I just heard about your gig at NARUC...You said without equivocation that new natural gas plants will become stranded assets within 15 years. Very good. Regulators need to hear that.”
The accelerating pace of advances in the kinds of technology that fuel the future eat conventional gen’s lunch. It’s so out-dated in terms of questions of tomorrow.
It’s a comment I stand by. Gas will likely continue to find a limited role for some time, cycling like hell, and serving as a critical back-stop to firm up renewables. But investments in new U.S. gas-fired baseload facilities are a very risky proposition these days. I notice that I still continue to be surprised by how quickly the change is occurring. As the financial flows shift to the modern energy economy – driven by the climate dynamic – this will only continue to accelerate. The lesson in the face of this profound level of uncertainty is simple: maintain your optionality by placing the smallest and most flexible bets possible. Sensibly, Jeff Bezos was correct, “it’s all about the data” -- understand that investing in data, and technology systems will underpin the future of the industry. Ergo, continue to invest in digital strategies that allow you to optimize the value.
As I mentioned at the top, I signed with Prometheus Press to publish my book!!! I even have an ISBN number: ISBN 978-1-63388-666-7 #pinchme. The imprint is a subsidiary of highly respected Globe Pequot Publishing house. I’m delivering the manuscript by mid-August, for publication in the Spring of 2021. I’m working right now to line up the site visits and interviews that will create ‘mental velcro’ that illustrates the critical points and sticks with the reader. To date, I’ve visited ISO-NE’s control room and Constellation Energy’s trading floor, the Massachusetts Wind Technology Testing Center, NEC’s battery team, and GE’s gas turbine experts in order to begin to tell the story of how electrons get generated, transported, coordinated, bought, and sold. My plans may be on hold for in-person visits for now but I'll be busy social distancing and gathering information in new ways. It’s already been so much fun and I'm just getting started!
'til Next Time...
Let's get used to virtually connecting for a while longer
OK – I simply have to stop apologizing for what I know is gonna happen, which is that the newsletter thing is going to be way later than I had hoped or expected. I'd love for you to take a look at my weekly ‘3 x 3’ video series on LinkedIn where I cover critical events of the prior week in three minutes. You can also catch me on my YouTube channel where I'm tying together those stories and the impacts on our energy future. Look at me... the king of multi-media over here.
And to put it lightly, there’s a lot we don’t know yet about COVID-19 and how it will affect all of us individually and globally, and how it will impact the energy sector as a whole. What has been made abundantly clear in the last few weeks with this virus is that whether we like it or not, we are all connected. What happens to one of us has the potential to affect us all.
The specter of climate change is in some ways not unlike the way this virus emerged. At first, we watched the fever from afar and it had little psychological impact, and then suddenly, it was here. With climate change, we are also already witnessing the first stages of an emerging global fever. The critical steps we take in the next few years to address this challenge will ultimately determine the levels of future pain and suffering we ultimately inflict on ourselves and the greater world we all share. Oof.
Welp, wash your hands more than you want to and stay healthy, folks. Seriously!
Sayonara!