Allianz board member Günther Thallinger makes a compelling case for the rapid expansion of renewable energy. He opens his DLD Future Hub talk with a stunning aerial image that looks like abstract art – until he reveals it’s a massive solar plant in Inner Mongolia.
Set to reach 100 gigawatts by 2030, it will produce the equivalent of coal power plants, Thallinger explains. “Renewables are clearly progressing”, he observes – and they’re key to shifting from an extractive to a circular economy.
“If we want to have circular really delivering on its purpose, we absolutely need this”, Thallinger says. “Because all the ‘re’ processes need so much energy: the recycling, the remanufacturing, the regaining of material.”
The investor also challenges the idea that green energy cannot replace fossil fuels. The sun alone delivers 170,000 terawatt hours to Earth’s atmosphere in just one hour – almost exactly what humanity consumes in an entire year, he points out.
Financing the energy transition should, in theory, not be an issue either, Thallinger argues. “You have roughly $5 trillion of investment need in the [clean] energy market”, he says, adding that fossil fuels currently receive $6 to $7 trillion per year. “If you distribute these subsidies in a different form, obviously you can cover the gap.”
What’s most urgently needed is the political will to implement change, Thallinger says, and further hesitation will be risky. “We see that major economies are running this transformation”, he notes. “In Germany, we also need to be in this race because otherwise they just will steamroll us with this energy that they have available, and the means how they use this energy.”
