Getting to be a commonplace observation amongst the net-zero sceptics, isn’t it: The conversion to (not) ‘renewables’ is simply not feasible, because of constraint of essential materials. And it isn’t just exotic minerals we’re looking at here. The tables given could have included iron-ore (for steel) which is also at or near all-time peak production, as the ore-grades still available get poorer and poorer (the highest grades being largely mined-out, when set against today’s demand for steel).
And that goes without even confronting the awkward fact that not one of the current ‘renewable’ systems can be made, run, repaired or replaced without constant subsidies of energy coming from - that’s right! - fossil hydrocarbons, aka lignite, coal, oil and natgas.
These simple, easily-seen realities just negate altogether the whole ‘conversion to green energy sources’ - as currently fantasised. It’s physically impossible; and it’s also financially impossible: the huge amounts of any sort of actually-credible money that would be required will never be available, understanding money as a credible claim on future energy supplies.
When in doubt, see the work of professor Charles Hall and associates on EROEI - energy returned on energy invested. This also demolishes the notions that we can either continue using fossil-hydrocarbon sources at current rates, or use them to power a global conversion to ‘renewables’.
We shall be converting to genuinely renewable energy sources, of course, because, as the fossil h/cs dwindle, we shall have no other option. The only current energy source that has even a limited (as in ‘Limits To Growth’) practicability that actually makes it still feasible is nuclear; preferably the new generation of radio-active-waste-eating nuclear technologies now being developed in Russia.
Other than that, we shall be returning to the renewed use of genuine renewables. And what that means is that a much-reduced human population will be depending on Sun/photosynthesis-created biomass - aka ‘wood’ - as the same major heat-source that it’s been throughout the whole of hom-sap-sap’s species lifetime. (A natural process which, btw, absolutely requires plenty of atmospheric CO2 from the Earth’s natural carbon-cycles, to work at all. Far from seeing it as a ‘pollutant’ - ludicrous idea! - we should see CO2 as the essential to life that it is.)
The real conversion to genuine renewables will be, of course, when the human demand for energy, and the natural regeneration of forests has got back into balance. And that means a drastic pulling in of horns. Fortunately, forest/steppe permaculture is by far the most feasible way for humans to get a living in the post-industrial, post energy-splurging times now coming up. Practical agriculturalists are already coming slowly to that realisation, as they struggle to keep their farm businesses going in these Interesting Times. You could say that there’s a grassroots movement in that direction; little noticed, but visibly happening. Widespread interest amongst strictly-practical farmers in regenerative-ag is a clear indicator that even bottom-line considerations are pushing things in that direction. I’ve been watching that slow, unremarked conversion to the first steps in regenerative-ag happening in the fields right where I live; for some years now; full-blast, soil-wrecking ploughing is going out of fashion - because it takes too much energy…
So - the genuine re-greening of the planet really is the best way to go. It’s just that it can’t do anything to serve the delusion that we can keep on occupying the Earth in our present numbers, and keep running energy-demand at its present utterly ludicrous levels. That way of life has been a transient flash-in-the-pan of Earth’s history; and it’s now on its slow, messy way out; along with Yoal Harari’s heart, which he and his startrekkytechietechie ilk will be eating out soon enough…
In a nutshell, there is at present simply NO known, actually-feasible way to keep splurging energy at the rate that we do just now. There are NO feasible replacement technologies available, and not even anytthing realistically promising anywhere on the horizon; only fantasies…
And with that in mind, I’d say to Robert: Don’t worry about your intermittency; there’s a lot of it about. 
Your posts are welcome whenever you feel inclined.
And PS: There’s really no need to obsess about today’s authoritarian attempts to impose walkable, semi-de-carred towns on us all. Walkable communities are now inevitable as car-culture declines and falls, EVs be buggered! Hah! A few leccytaxis per community is the greatest extent that that will ever reach.
