Climate

The number gives you a ballpark of what natural gas is used for in the US, which is not just for generation. As the fossils are going away right now (look at fossil energy cost of energy going up exponentially), we need to substitute everything by electrification, stat. This means mostly photovoltaics, since it's the only source that can scale. Due to night, clouds and snow cover the capacity factor of solar is some 10% of nameplate over the year, where I sit. So for full natgas substitution you need to multiply the natgas consumption by 10 to obtain the necessary photovoltaics nameplate. Apart from night which gives you zero you'd be generating a massive surplus during the summer and very little during the winter. So for seasonal buffering you need a lot, several months to half a year of nameplate capacity. Which is why many talk about hydrogen here, not batteries.

These are still bogglingly large numbers, but we shouldn't forget substituting for coal and oil, and also nuke. Plus added demand for all the additional renewable infrastructure construction, while we're running out of mineral resources.

What I meant to show that the numbers show you that it's impossible at scale. Nevermind that all but biofuel harvesting infra can't be build without fossil energy and chemical equivalents.

So the scale will self-adjust nolens volens. With all the nasty consequences for the human primate, and the rest of the poor ecosystem.