Energy Transition Lessons from the Netherlands Natural Gas Transition
The world is going through historic transitions, a global shift of energy, transportation, and consumption that will impact every aspect of our lives, but is that not the norm and could we learn from De Nederlandse aardgastransiti (“the Netherlands natural gas transition“) in the 1960s?
De Nederlandse aardgastransitie
Humanity has not always used petroleum, natural gas, and coal as its dominant energy sources. It transitioned from wood to coal, but that transition took a long time. What can we learn from these historical transitions to effectively deal with the modern energy transition? The author, Sven Ringelberg, natural gas-free project consultant and entrepreneur behind Simpel Subsidie, wrote his book De Nederlandse aardgastransitie: Lessen voor de De Nederlandse aardgastransitie, or Dutch natural gas transition: Lessons for the Dutch natural gas transition, which looks at the shift from coal to gas for space heating in the Netherlands in the 1960s and the lessons that we could take from this transition that took under 10 years. The book is published in Dutch by Eburon.
The Netherlands transition from coal for space heating to natural gas compared to the world transition from fossil fuels for heating, power, transport, and industrial processes might seem like comparing apple and oranges, but the energy transition is happening on multiple fronts at multiple scales. This book is primarily aimed at those thinking about the Netherlands and their current “energietransitie” away from natural gas and towards renewable energy, but all countries are facing their own energy transition and this book offers interesting insights into how on a country level the energy transition can be done. And it comes in a delightful, well-written package.
The current energietransitie in the Netherlands with projects and the creation of gas-free neighbourhoods, increasing insulation, and expanding renewable energy has a parallel with the 1960s energy transition.
Natural Gas and Glittering Nuclear Future
In 1959, the Netherlands discovered a massive gas pocket near Slochteren. The company that discovered it and the Dutch government negotiated, and 10 years later, a country that had normally only heated one room in its homes with coal had converted the majority of its cooking and heating to natural gas, and had introduced more widespread central heating.
This rapid deployment of natural gas is explored in depth in the book, from the negotiations and the reasoning behind it, including one of the main drivers and assumptions of the government at the time. In the 1960s, it was expected that nuclear power would be the future and that if the gas supply was not quickly developed and exploited, it would be hard to recoup the investment, so a plan was created to quickly develop and exploit the natural gas energy source that was expected to last 30 years. Gasunie, a company that was a public-private partnership, encouraged gas use with regressive tariffs. With the tariffs, gas got less expensive the more people used.
Something in the Air
In the 1960s, the marketing for natural gas was about the benefits of using more gas the cosiness and luxury of heat, but in the 1970s, things changed. The Club of Rome publishing the Limits of Growth in 1972 and the oil crisis in 1973 changed the focus from using as much as possible to saving as much as possible.
The book goes into detail about this change of focus and the results, including a focus on more insulation and how gas was promoted.
Advertisements for economical use of natural gas from the 1970s. Source: International Institute of Social History, provided by Sven Ringalberg
The Background
The domestic heating and cooking situation in the 1950s Netherlands was split between multiple types — electric, city gas, coal, and oil. Each had its advantages and disadvantages, but town gas was dominant in cooking and coal was dominant in space heating — but this space heating was limited to the living room due to cost. In the book, Sven discusses how the post-war Netherlands was dealing with the issues of destroyed housing and sub-standard housing and worked to resolve this issue, but rising social standards had created a rising desire for more comfortable central heated homes, and while propaganda for coal talked about the comfortable living room stove, the negatives of coal, oil, town gas, and electric were well known to the users. Natural gas was abundant, cheap, cleaner, and could use the existing town gas network, which created an opportunity for natural gas to become a widespread heat and energy source if properly planned.
Year of Silence
Furthermore, the government benefited from revenue that allowed it to spend on education, infrastructure, and social welfare without tax burden, but after the initial discovery in Slochteren, the discovery was hardly reported on beyond the initial reports of a discovery. Sven Ringelberg discussed the reasons behind the “silence of Slochteren” and how the deal was not nationalization but also not privatization. The details of this arrangement included Shell, Esso, and government entities.
The Transition
The deal between the companies, national government departments, and city municipalities outlined the whole planned transition, from pricing, infrastructure, marketing materials, and the roles of each player in the transition. Sven Ringelberg goes into deep detail about this planning process and each part of the transition, from laying the large backbone of natural gas pipelines to transferring the gas from Slochteren to the municipalities, to the process of switching neighbourhoods to natural gas and retrofitting old town gas stoves.
Design gas transport network in the Netherlands 1963–1975. Source: Gasunie. provided by Sven Ringalberg.
Lessons to Learn from a 20th-Century Transition for the 21st-Century Transition
According to Sven Ringelberg, this quick (10 years) and somewhat painless transition was helped by a number of factors. One key factor was leadership from the central government that shaped the goals and provided the resources from key partners and agencies to promptly design and plan the transition, which is contrasted against what’s happening now in the Netherlands in 2021, in which municipal governments are tasked with this job but where they lack the resources and might only have “one and a half men and a horse’s head” to create pilots. The fragmentation of responsibilities and resources has led to a lack of standardization (which increases costs) and less momentum towards the goal.
Sven Ringelberg discusses how focusing on financial benefits might be the wrong route to people choosing to go gas-free, that putting a price on something does not always lead to buy-in from the public, but focus on the non-financial benefits that people get from a gas-free home is key, such as comfort or reducing your impact on the environment. This aspect will impact many customer-facing transitions, like the move from fossil fuel vehicles to electric vehicles.
Final Word
Sven Ringelberg has managed to turn a subject that could have easily been a dry, dusty, academic read into a very engaging and informative read. The book has diagrams and tables of key statics, but also anecdotes — from Pinkie from coal propaganda to Kees the gas dog. The book provides a rear-view mirror to contemplate what has taken us to here and what might be needed to keep driving towards a better future.
Gas dog Kees from The Utrecht Archives, provided by Sven Ringalberg.
Pinkie the cat in Beatrijs, Catholic weekly for women, 19-07-1958, provided by Sven Ringalberg.
For now only available in Dutch, this is a much-needed addition to energy transition literature that readers from around the world could learn lessons from.
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Over the next two years, homebuilder Lennar is outfitting more than 1,500 new Colorado homes with Dandelion Energy’s geothermal systems in one of the largest residential geothermal rollouts in the US.
The big draw for homeowners is lower energy bills and cleaner heating and cooling. Dandelion claims Lennar homeowners with geothermal systems will collectively save around $30 million over the next 20 years compared to using air-source heat pumps. Geothermal heat pumps don’t need outdoor AC units or conventional heating systems, either.
Geothermal systems use the sustained temperature of the ground to heat or cool a home. A ground loop system absorbs heat energy (BTUs) from the earth so that it can be transferred to a heat pump and efficiently converted into warmth for a home. Dandelion says its ground loop systems are built to last for over 50 years and should require no maintenance.
Dandelion’s geothermal system uses a vertical ground closed-loop system that is installed using well-boring equipment and trenched back into the house to connect to a heat pump. The pipes circulate a mixture of water and propylene glycol, a food-grade antifreeze, that absorbs the ground’s temperature. A ground source heat pump circulates the liquid through the ground loops and it exchanges its heat energy in the heat pump with liquid refrigerant. The refrigerant is converted to vapor, compressed to increase its temperature, then passed through a heat exchanger to transfer heat to the air, which is circulated through a home’s HVAC ductwork.
Daniel Yates, Dandelion Energy’s CEO, called the partnership with Lennar a “new benchmark for affordable, energy-efficient, and high-quality home heating and cooling.” By streamlining its installation process, Dandelion is making geothermal systems simpler and cheaper for homebuilders and homeowners to adopt.
This collaboration is happening at a time when Colorado is pushing hard to meet its clean energy targets. Governor Jared Polis is excited about the move, calling it a win for Coloradans’ wallets, air quality, and the state’s leadership on geothermal energy. Will Toor, executive director of the Colorado Energy Office, said that “ensuring affordable access to geothermal heating and cooling is essential to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050, and we’re excited to be part of such a huge effort to bring this technology to so many new Colorado homes.”
And it’s not just about cutting emissions – geothermal heat pumps help reduce peak electric demand. Analysis from the Department of Energy found that widespread adoption of these systems could save the US from needing 24,500 miles of new transmission lines. That’s like crossing the continental US eight times.
Colorado is making this transition a lot more attractive through state tax credits and Xcel Energy’s rebate programs. These incentives slash upfront costs for builders like Lennar, making geothermal installations more financially viable. The utility’s Clean Heat Plan and electrification strategy are working to keep energy bills low while meeting climate goals.
Read more: This will be the first geothermal energy storage system on the Texas grid
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Polestar has removed the Polestar 2 from its US website header in an early sign of how new tariffs will restrict choice and competition for American consumers, thus increasing prices.
The Polestar 2 is Polestar’s first full EV – the original Polestar 1 was a limited-edition plug-in hybrid.
It started production in 2020 in Luqiao, Zhejiang, China, where Polestar and Volvo’s parent corporation, Geely, was founded.
And there’s the rub: while Polestar’s newer EV, the 3 (which we just drove the new single motor version of last week), is built in South Carolina, the 2 is not.
Unfortunately, that interacts with some news that has been getting a lot of play lately: tariffs.
The US has been gradually getting stupider and stupider on the issue of tariffs, apparently determined to increase prices for Americans and decrease the competitiveness of American manufacturing in a time of change for the auto industry.
It is widely acknowledged (by anyone who has given it a few seconds of thought) that tariffs increase prices and that trade barriers tend to reduce competition, leading to less innovation.
It started with 25% tariffs on various products from China, implemented in the 2018-2020 timeframe. Then, in 2024, President Biden implemented a 100% tariff on Chinese EVs, effectively stopping their sale in the US. These tariffs included some exceptions and credits based on Volvo’s other US manufacturing, which Polestar had used to keep the most expensive versions of the 2 on sale in the US, while restricting the lower-priced versions from sale. Nevertheless, they were a bad idea.
Now, in yet another step to make America less competitive and inflate the prices of goods more for Americans, we got more tariff announcements today from a senile ex-reality TV host who wandered into the White House rose garden (which he does not belong in). These tariffs do not include the same exceptions as the previously-announced Biden tariffs.
Apparently this has all been enough for Polestar, as even in advance of today’s tariff announcements, the company suddenly removed its Polestar 2 from its website header today.
The change can be seen at polestar.com/us, where only the Polestar 3 and 4 are listed in the header area. On other sites, like the company’s Norwegian website or British website, the car is still there. The Polestar 2 page is still up on the US website, but it isn’t linked to elsewhere on the site (we’ll see how long it stays up).
We reached out to Polestar for comment, but didn’t hear anything back before publication. We’ll update if we do.
It makes sense that the Polestar 2 would still be for sale elsewhere, as it only started production in 2020. Most car models are available for at least 7 years, so this is an earlier exit than expected.
So it’s likely that all of the tariff news is what had an effect in killing the Polestar 2.
Then again, this is also just the second day of a new fiscal quarter. Perhaps the timing offers Polestar an opportunity to make a clean break – especially now that the lower-priced version of its Polestar 3 is available.
Despite the lower $67.5k base price of the new Polestar 3 variant, that represents a big increase in price for the brand, which had sold the base model Polestar 2 for around $50k originally, before all of these tariffs.
Update: Polestar got back to us with comment, but understandably, it doesn’t say much:
Polestar is a three-car company and Polestar 2 is available for customers now. There are a select number of Polestar 2s in stock at retailers that can be found on Polestar.com, but Polestar 3 and Polestar 4 will be the priority in the North American market.
Electrek’s Take
This isn’t the first car that America has been deprived of due to tariffs. The Volvo EX30, one of our most anticipated vehicles, and Electrek’s Vehicle of the Year for 2024, had its American availability pushed back due to tariffs.
Volvo decided to build the car in Belgium and export it to the US, but now that new tariffs apply to the EU as well, maybe that low-priced, awesome, fast, small EV will instead stay in Europe instead of being shipped overseas.
This shows how mercurial tariff fiats from an ignoramus are bad for manufacturing, as they mean that companies can’t make plans – and if they can’t make plans, eventually, they’ll probably just write the country making the random decisions out of their plans so they don’t have to deal with the nonsense.
And we’ve heard this from every businessperson or manufacturer representative we’ve talked to at any level of the automotive industry. Nobody thinks any of this is a good idea, because it objectively is not. All it does is make business harder, make the US less trustworthy, make things more expensive, and overall just harm America.
Yet another way that Americans are getting screwed by this stupid nonsense. 49% of you voted for inflation, and 100% of Americans are now getting it. Happy Inflation Day, everyone.
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Lucid Motors (LCID) has now had six straight quarters with higher deliveries. The delivery record comes just as Lucid prepares to begin delivering its first electric SUV, the Gravity, to customers by the end of this month.
Lucid sets sixth straight delivery record in Q1 2025
Lucid delivered 3,109 vehicles in the first quarter, up 58% from last year and topping its previous record of 3,099 set in Q4 2024.
The company also produced 2,213 vehicles at its Casa Grande, Arizona, plant in the first three months of 2025, an increase of 28% from last year. Another 600 vehicles were in transit to Saudi Arabia, where they will be assembled at its new AMP-2 plant, Lucid’s first international manufacturing facility.
At this pace, Lucid will easily top the roughly 10,200 vehicles it delivered last year in 2025 at around 12,500. Lucid will likely see even more growth this year, with customer deliveries of its first electric SUV starting soon.
During the Gravity SUV’s “celestial arrival” last week in NYC, Lucid’s interim CEO Marc Winterhoff said the EV maker is “nearly finished building all the vehicles that we wanted to build to put them into our studio and for test drives.”
| Q4 2022 | Q1 2023 | Q2 2023 | Q3 2023 | Q4 2023 | Full-year 2023 | Q1 2024 | Q2 2024 | Q3 2024 | Q4 2024 | Full-year 2024 | Q1 2025 | |
| Lucid EV deliveries by quarter | 1,932 | 1,406 | 1,404 | 1,457 | 1,734 | 6,001 | 1,967 | 2,394 | 2,781 | 3,099 | 10,241 | 3,109 |
Winterhoff added, “by the end of April, we will resume customer deliveries of the Gravity.” Lucid delivered the first models in December, but they were for employees, friends, and family.
Lucid calls the Gravity a “no compromise” SUV with a range of up to 450 miles, 120 cubic feet of interior space, advanced technology, and sports car-like performance. The Gravity Grand Touring starts at $94,900, while the Touring model will arrive later this year at $79,900.
The new delivery record comes after Winterhoff told Fox Business last week that Lucid has seen a “dramatic uptick over the past two months” in orders from former Tesla drivers.
Currently, “50% of all the orders we have are from former Tesla owners,” Lucid’s CEO said. Winterhoff added that many are “looking for an option to not continue having a Tesla.”
Will we see the trend continue? Tesla announced earlier today that it delivered 336,681 vehicles in the first quarter, far less than the 390,000 Wall Street analysts expected.
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