Energy Sustainability
James C. Stoneman
EVSP312
Introduction to Sustainability
February 21, 2015
Energy Sustainability The future is in the hands of the current generation and how each and every one of today’s individuals will impact the health of the environment. With the rapid growth of the world’s population, the use of energy is becoming overwhelming. The need to improve the use of energy resources are a most, and the reduction of emissions need to dramatically shift into a more sustainable direction. By doing so, not only will it benefit the energy crisis, it will benefit the future of the environment. The use of more renewable energy which would be more sustainable could include wind turbines, solar, and thermal energy. These options would be beneficial to all locations that could use one or the other to help reduce the amount pollution being emitted into the air. Examples would be the North East, a beneficial renewable resource would be solar power do to the amount of sunlight. Also having the population within the area with large cities could start to incorporate solar panels on the top of the building and be able to operate at least a 50% capacity with just the panels. This alone would reduce a large amount of energy production from energy pants using fossil fuels which produces carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Areas such as the South West would benefit from solar panels as well, however, another great resource that would help the area would be wind turbines. These resources will apply to a better sustainable environment not just for the United States but for the rest of the world. Below is a chart that shows the regional and fuel split for the generation of the world’s electricity. This chart gives the use of energy as a pie chart and it breaks down the usage by country and what they are using for their primary energy source.
(Razykov, Ferekides, Morel, Stefanakos, Ullal, & Upadhyaya, 2011, p.465)
After looking over the chart it is clear that most of the countries are using are large amount of fossil fuels to produce there energy. The chart provided below also shows that at current state of development of technologies break down each one by what they generate to what the barriers are associated with. As one would take a look at the chart, it includes the fossil fuels along with more sustainable renewable resources which are an option for many counties to consider. Looking forward in the direction of improving the crisis of energy and the health of the environment. Taking the barriers into consideration of how each one affects the environment in most cases will determine the outcome of how much if any of the resource will be used. Fossil fuels seem to come up in many conversations and political debates on how much it truly affects the environment. Carbon dioxide is consider the primary emissions that are being emitted due to humans, and CO2 has accounted for just about 82% which are produce in the United States. (Carbon Dioxide Emissions, Climate Change, US EPA, n.d.) To break it down just a little further of the contributions of CO2, Residential and Commercial 9%, Industry 14%, Transportation 32%, Electricity 38%, and Other non-fossil fuels of combustion are 6%. (Carbon Dioxide Emissions, Climate Change, US EPA, n.d.) With the cost listed on the chart as well show the difference between the usages of all resources across the board. What most do not take into consideration is what is free to all as long as it is applied. Examples of these fee resources is the Sunlight (converted: electricity and chemical energy), Wind (harvested with wind turbines, and windmills), Biomass (organic, used for cooking along with heating to also include transportation for fuel), Heat from the internal Earth (electricity and heating). (Razykov, Ferekides, Morel, Stefanakos, Ullal, & Upadhyaya, 2011, p.465) Given the pro and cons of the sustainability of energy brings many ideas and direction to
