The author of this piece may have been well advised to refrain from making dubious claims in the magazine of the one of the most venerated engineering societies on the planet. Although Vaclav Smil’s bona fides in the area of energy are impressive, his publication of highly dubious statistics remain elusive. He is a researcher firmly entrenched in the petroleum industry. Consequently, he should not have been surprised that the brilliant members of the IEEE would call him out on his veiled and specious defense of the fossil fuel industry.
The best part of the story, however, is the simple fact that academic and professional societies remain great bastions of open and brutally honest discourse. Science and engineering are not for the faint of heart. If you can’t stand having your bullshit called out, then get out of the field. As professor emeritus, Smil may have elected an unceremonious exit. At least, that’s what he seems to indicate in his response to the long list of complaints about his post: out of 10s of comments that point out errors in his analysis, he acknowledges the only one that defends his dubious claims with a bogus link.
Source: Germany’s Energiewende, 20 Years Later – IEEE Spectrum
