One of the issues regarding energy that often gets missed is the financial implications of the transition away from fossil fuels. With assets worth many trillions of dollars, which a transition away from oil could well render worthless, one has to worry about the economic consequences once the penny drops.

I think the problem is that many people just don’t realise just how fossil fuels, in particular oil, is deeply embedded in the world economy. Just considering the world’s top ten oil companies, they pull in about $3 trillion in revenue each year. If just those ten companies formed their own country, they’d be the 5th largest economy in the world. So a not insignificant amount of the money sloshing around the world’s financial markets is fossil fuel money. Either the profits raked in by oil companies, which they are looking to invest (notably the oil revenue…