What technology will become the dominant means of decarbonizing each part of the economy?

The pattern we see now — and that we expect to continue to see over the coming decades — is a series of battles between consistent contenders: electricity, hydrogen and carbon capture. 

Electricity is hitting its stride. The power sector is getting cleaner, and electrification is spreading to light-duty vehicles and even residential boilers. But electricity actually has only a 20% market share of all energy end uses. So what do we do with the remaining 80%?

These are tough-to-decarbonize arenas that rely on hard-to-replace fossil fuels: heavy-duty vehicles, aviation, maritime shipping, chemical manufacturing, iron and steel.  

Shayle called up Andy Lubershane, senior vice president of research and strategy at Energy Impact Partners, to game it out. Andy has been writing about the potential phases of the energy transition and the roles these three technologies could play in different sectors. 

Andy and Shayle got the inspiration for Deep Decarbonization: Infinity War from Andy’s love of games. Not only does he use games as a tool to think about the energy transition, but he is actually in the process of creating his own board game. 

It’s Deep Decarbonization: Infinity War. Let’s go.

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