You (Fab) mentioned back when Germany was the leader on renewable energy. I remember this well. The Canadian province of Ontario took the design of the subsidy Germany used more or less as is. In English they called it a feed-in tariff: Feed-in tariffs in Germany - Wikipedia
I remember it from having arguments with my dad. He was never a fan of environmentalism, so his take would be, “you wouldn’t believe what Germans have to pay for power because of this damned renewable nonsense you’re blathering on about.”
I did come across a pair of scientists who wrote, not a scientific paper exactly, but an opinion piece with a lot of references, with a level of skepticism on the transition exceeding even yours. They don’t think it can be done at all (“it” being maintain our lifestyles and sub out with alternative “cleaner” technologies). They think there’s nothing for it but to cut population dramatically (not with a cull, by birth control) and give up a lot of modern conveniences – think horse and buggy: Energies | Free Full-Text | Through the Eye of a Needle: An Eco-Heterodox Perspective on the Renewable Energy Transition | HTML
I’m not sure what to make of it, except there’s no way people would go for that. Perhaps their references would be useful when you and Mike talk about these issues.