A new answer to the biggest climate conundrum

One of the more robust reasons for comes from two simple facts and a delightful kicker. The facts are that electricity is a wonderfully versatile way of powering all sorts of things, and that lots of technologies can now generate it without emitting greenhouse gases. The kicker is that one of these technologies, , is both very cheap and getting cheaper.This suggests a simple strategy. Make the grid emissions-free and do everything you can with electricity. The obstacles to the first part of this nostrum—which include restricted access to capital in poor countries, constrained grid capacity and a lack of storage to offset fluctuating supply—are no less daunting for their familiarity. But they are increasingly the target of policy and investment. Last year, for example, the world spent more on new stationary electricity-storage capacity than it did on constructing nuclear-power stations.