[justbrowsingthx]

I'm not sure I understand your point. Perhaps you disagree with the author on the desirability of a future in which virtually unlimited energy is available to humankind in its current state (see the upshot on nuclear fusion p. 269, for example). His cautious take on our collective ability to manage our energetic needs[0] does not seem unwarranted to me.

Regardless, I think the book remains useful for its intended audiences as a quantitative assessment of available energy sources given our growth path.

[0] "The rookie mistake here is assuming that adults are in charge." (p. 134)

[stouset]

"Virtually unlimited energy" is where the argument completely falls apart. It's a myth we need to stop spreading. As I said elsewhere, we have only a bit over 200 years at our current 2.3% annual growth in energy usage before we start raising the temperature of the Earth purely from a thermodynamic perspective.

Completely blanketing the Earth in solar panels gets us a few hundred years more (thanks to the fact that that solar energy is already hitting the planet whether or not we use it for electricity), but that's assuming we've developed panels with magical levels of efficiency and we're okay with 0% of sunlight reaching the Earth's surface.

Four hundred years of sustained energy growth at current levels is the most that could happen on this planet under comically-implausible circumstances, and when we reduce the absurdity even just a bit (greenhouse gases still exist, we won't blanket the planet in perfectly-efficient solar cells), we optimistically might get two hundred years more before we hit an energy wall that cannot be overcome without a complete overthrow of thermodynamics as we understand it.

Is that still a lot of growth? Sure. But it's about the same window of time as the industrial revolution until now.

https://dothemath.ucsd.edu/2011/07/galactic-scale-energy/