Monografía
Is there enough energy in the world to cover human
necessities?
Carolina
Alabern
4eso G
Business
Index
Front
cover………………………………………………………………………..page1
Answer to the
question……………………………………………………………page4
Webgrafía……………………………………………….…………………………page8
Bibliografía……………………………………………………………………..….page9
Is there enough energy in the world to cover human
necessities?
The world population of today is estimated to be around 7 billion
people. The world population has had a continuous growth since half way through
the fourteenth century. It is expected to reach an oustanding number of 10,5
billion people by 2050. This could reach to overpopulation, which would mean
threats to the ecosystem. Problems like global warming and pollution will only
get worse by the population expansion. You could already see a big difference
between 2000 and 2005 with an amazing 383,047 million people in the entire
world in five years. During the twentieth century there was the greatest
increase in population ever seen, this was because there was such a change in
the way of living of people. It was also due to the mortality rate as it
increased because of sanitation and new medicines, also due to an increase in
agriculture. It went from the year 1700 to the 2000 ten times more people. All
around the world, the worlds population has slowly been declining since 1963
when it was a 2,19%, but growth remains very high in places like Latin America
and The Middle East. In some places there is a negative population growth so it
balances out.
The USA is probably the place that uses most energy in the whole
world. This is due to the amount of people that live there. They use about
87,216 kWh when India only use 6,280 kWh a year. This big difference is because
the USA is a very industrialised and India is not. Here is a table with useful imformation.
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Regional energy use (kWh/cap.)
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kWh/capita
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Population (mil)
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1990
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2008
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1990
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2008
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USA
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89 021
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87 216
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305
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EU-27
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40 240
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40 821
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Middle East
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19 422
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34 774
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199
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China
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8 839
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18 608
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1 333
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Latin America
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11 281
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14 421
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462
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Africa
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7 094
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7 792
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984
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India
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4 419
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6 280
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1 140
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The World
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19 421
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21 283
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6 688
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This shows us
that there are big differences between different countries in energy use. As I
said before, this is only due to countries that are more industrialised and are
more rich, not necessarily this but normally more industrialised countries are
better off.. We could also observe that in China there is almost five times
more population than in the USA but they use 1/8 of the energy that the USA
use.
The worlds
energy consumption increase over 5% in 2010. There was a slight decrease in
2009. This strong increase is the result of two converging trends.
Industrialized countries which had experienced decreases in energy demand in
2009 have now recovered, almost having a historical trend. China and India did
not change the demand, and have continued their high demand of energy. This
drop in 2009 was all due to economic crisis.
In 2008 the
total energy that was being consumed in all the world was 132,000 TWh. This is
about 15 terawatts. This amount of energy to form with renewable energy would
mean you would have to create a specific amount of solar energy, wind power,
geothermal energy, biomass, hydropower and ocean energy. It has been calculated
that more than half of the energy has been consumed in the last two decades
since the industrial revolution. This is despite advances in efficiency and
sustainability. Because of such high increase in the population, the annual CO2 has increased a 10% and so has the gross energy production. There is
an estimation of the remaining non-renewable energy worldwide with the
remaining fossil fuels of and estimated 0,4 YJ which is not that much
considering what we use every year. The available uranium left is about 2,5 YJ.
Renewable energy comes from natural resources which are naturally replenished.
As of 2010 about 16% of global energy consumption comes from renewable energy.
Solar energy is
one way out of trouble, our earth receives and incredible supply of solar
energy. The sun is just an average star, which has been up there for about 4
billion years. In one minute, it provides enough energy to supply our needs for
one year. In one day, it provides more energy than we could consume in 27
years. Apparently you could say that three days of the amount of radiation
strikes on our earth, is equivalent to the amount of energy stored in all
fossil energy sources. Solar energy has a great potential if everyone agreed
with it, but because not everyone wants to make changes in their way of living
it makes it more difficult. People don’t want to spend a bit of money just to
make better our planet. Solar power is clean green electricity that is created
from sunlight, or heat from the sun. Having solar power in a home, generally
means setting up solar photovoltaic or a solar thermal system on the roof.
Solar energy is a renewable free source of energy that is sustainable and
totally inexhaustible, unlike fossil fuels which are finite. It is also a
non-polluting source of energy and it does not emit and greenhouse gases when
producing electricity. It can supplement your entire or partial energy
consumption. Using solar power means reducing your energy bills and saving
money. They are low maintenance and unobtrusive, installing solar panels adds
value to your home.
Another source of
renewable energy is Hydroelectricity which is electricity generated by
hydropower. This is made by the use of the gravitational force of falling or flowing
water. It is said, that it is the one most used in the world from renewable
energy. It makes 16% of global electricity. It is produced in 150 countries.
The bigges hydroelectricity plants are in China, Brazil and in Venezuela. Moving
water is a very powerful source of energy responsable for lighting entire
cities, even countries. It all started with the Greeks then they created
kinetic
energy from the water wheels.
This source of energy consists of a water reservoir enclosed by a dam, so when
the gates open the water will flow through and the turbines will spin and this
will make electricity.
Wind power is another source of renewable energy. Wind power is growing at
a rate of 30% annually, and it has a capacity of 238,000 megawatts. It is used
in Europe, Asia and the United States. Wind power ir one of the most promising
new energy sources. They are very expensive to build. As we have such
technology now a days, wind energy could provide 20% of America’s electricity
with turbines installed on less tan 1% of its land area, this would also mean
that less tan 5% of the land would be occupied by wind equipment. This would
leave 95% for everything else. Windmills have been around for about 1500 years,
and now it has become affordable and even cheaper than fossil fuels. There are
many places around the world that offer wind-generated electricity for only 2
to 3 cents per kWh. So in one household you could have 25% of your electricity
from wind power and only spend $4 to $5 dollars a month. The Price of wind
energy is now dropping so more people use it. This involves converting wind
energy into electricity by using wnd turbines. Wind comes from atmospheric
changes; changes in temperatura and pressure makes air move around the surface
of the earth. A wind turbine captures the wind to produce energy. It is clean
energy source that can be relied on for the long-term future. A wind turbine
creates reliable, cost-effective, pollution free energy. It is affordable,
clean and sustainable. One wind turbine can be sufficient to generate enough
electrical energy for a household.
Biomass was a predominant fuel until the beginning of the nineteenth
century. Now it has a small share in energy supply. It has gone up to about 220
GW used for heating in places like Spain, Germany and Poland. This term of
energy refers to organic matters that store energy through the process of
photosynthesis. It now exists in one form as plants, it may be transferred
through the food chain to animals. This can be converted for everyday use in
processes like combustion. This is when it releases the carbon dioxide stored
in the plant. Many of these fuels that are used today come in the form of wood
products or dried vegetation. It has become a widely used source of renewable
energy in the last two decades. Biomass is a collective term for all plants and
animals material. A number of different forms of biomass can be burned or
digested to produce energy. Examples include Wood, Straw, poultry litter and
energy crops such as willow and poplar grown on short rotation coppice and
miscanthus. Biomass is a very versatile material and can be use to produce
heat, electricity and a combination of heat and power. The UK has some of the
largest examples of the use of Biomass to generate electricity.
There are many
different forms of renewable energy, some other one could be tidal energy,
ocean termal energy, wave energy, and hot fusión energy. Tidal energy uses the
gravitational energy from the attraction of the sun., earth and moon. Ocean
termal energy is when it exploits the greatest collector of solar energy on
earth, the sea. Wave energy is when the waves crash and turbines spin, this is
originated by the wind, which is driven by sunlight. Hot fusión is not 100% renewable because it
uses hydrogen, but hydrogen is so abundant that it is considered to be so much
that it is limitless, especially for human purposes.
All renewable energy forms have advantages and
disadvantages. We can not really assure that all these energy sources could
give us 100% of energy that we need, but it could give us most of it and it
would mean that we would not damage the atmosphere like we are doing now. Like
most renewable sources, none of these could really compete with inexpensive
fossil fuels at the time.
These sources of energy can
really help the change from non-renewable energy to renewable energy. This is
environmentally friendly energy, this would improve our planet and would mean
that we would not be in danger of not having energy. Most of these sources of
energy have low costs and are easy to run. All of these have the potencial to
avoid us having trouble when there arent many non-renewable energy sources
left. At the moment these energy sources
are a bit more expensive than fossil fuels.
Economic renewable energy
development typically requires that countries exploit their natural renewable
resources with subsidies reducing in line with technology costs and market
maturity. Thailand has adopted such an approach to renewable development and
while its biomass has the greatest renewable generation potential, the rapid
growth of solar development could conceivably see solar challenge wind power as
the kindon’s second most important renewable resource by the next decade. As a
country, Thailand benefits front strong year-round solar radiation with the
largely rural northeast Isaan región of the country benefiting most.
Windfarms do not cause
long-term damage to bird populations. A large majority of birds can co-exist
with operating windfamrs, but some species are harmed during construction. There
should be more windfarms, people complain a lot about wind famrs but they dont
realice how much damage there is because we are not using clean energy. There
sould be renewable energy in each city.
Renewable energy is clean
energy and non-polluting. Many forms do not emit any grenhouse gases or toxic
waste in the process of producing electricity. It is sustainable energy source
which can de relied on for the long-term unlike energy we use at the momento.
Renewable energy is cost-effective and efficient. Increasingly, governments
around the world are turning to renewable energy to end our dependence on
fossil fuels.
I have reached a conclusion
that yes there is enough energy in the world to cover human necessities,
because our necessities in fact are taking a small proportion of the energy we
consume, the rest is a waste.
Webgrafía
Bibliografía
Jürgen Peterman, Energy future, efficiency
and renewable energies in the heating sector, Viessman.
