Faced with pollution and rising sea levels, cities are setting targets at a record pace.

To adapt Thomas Pynchon, if the wrong question is asked, the answer doesn’t matter. Today, the world seems to be consciously framing its energy problems in a way that avoids the right questions, and thus true solutions.

One day after the PM appeared to throw his support behind the development of a new coal plant for Australia – to shore up the nation’s “continuous power sources” – AGL Energy CEO Andy Vesey has delivered a couple of energy market home truths and clarifications: renewables will be the only source of new baseload energy in Australia, and coal cannot compete.

Prime minister Malcolm Turnbull appears to have caved in to the fossil fuel lobby and the right wing of his Coalition after announcing that he would look at the need to replace coal-fired power stations with “continuous power sources” such as new coal, or gas.