Volts The fate of fossil fuel systems in the "mid-transition"
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Mar 4, 2026 
Emily Grubert, associate professor of sustainable energy policy at Notre Dame and researcher on mid-transition challenges, discusses shrinking fossil systems and the concept of minimum viable scale. Short scenes explore physical and financial cliffs, declining infrastructure and workers, equity harms from haphazard closures, and why public ownership or coordinated governance could help manage decline.
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Run Governance Demonstrations To Build Trust
- Pre-plan managed shutdowns and overdo early demonstrations to build trust and prove decline management can work.
- Grubert recommends governance demonstrations to show communities stepwise examples of managed exits.
Planning Decline Needs High Social Trust
- Successful mid-transition requires social trust and explicit commitment to succeed; failures are numerous without it.
- Grubert notes past programs (BRAC, rail restructuring) show government-led closures can work but need high trust and coordination.
Physical Turndown Limits Break Models’ Assumptions
- Physical cliffs are real: many assets have turndown limits (e.g., refineries ~60–70% throughput), so models assuming tiny residual operation are unrealistic.
- Grubert urges distinguishing physics limits from mere cost issues when modeling.