Efficient Energy Use

Energy affects nearly every aspect of our lives. fossil fuels and electricity appear to be plentiful, less expensive, and readily available. Ignoring taxes, a gallon of gasoline doesnt cost much more expensive than a gallon of bottled water. we turn on our appliances and lights with the flip of a switch, giving little tought to how the electricity is generated, or the consequences of its generation. Energy produces affect governments and the world economy in large scale. World wide energy use has increased 4 fold since 1950. This dramatic increase in energy use enabled economic growth and higher standards of living for a sizable fraction. Following WWII petroleum production rapidly accelerted. Use of natural gas and nuclear power both grew rapidly during the past 30 years. Fossil fuel provide about 80% of the global energy supply today. Among fossil fuels, petroleum provides the largest share and accounts for about 35% of the total global energy supply. Coal provides about 23% and natural gas about 21%. Of the total renewable energy sources account for about 14% of the global energy supply, but most of this is in the form of traditional energy sources. Modern renewable energy sources, including hydropower, wind power, and modern forms of bio energy, account for only about one third of the renewable energy total, nuclear energy provides the remaining 6% of the global energy supply (UNDP 2000).

About one third of the world's population 2 billion people - still rely almost entirely on fire wood and other traditional energy sources for their energy needs. these households do not consume electricity petroleum products, or natural gas - a major factor contributing to their impoverishment.

Business as usual forecasts project that global energy use will increase around 2 percent per year in the coming decades. For example, the 2000 World Energy Outlook produced by the International Energy Agency projects in its Reference Scenario that world energy demand will increase by 54% between 1997 and 2020. Oil use would increase by 56%, natural gas use by 86% and coal use by 49 % in this forecast. Fossil fuels would account for nearly 84 percent of total primary energy supply in 2020, up from their 80 % share in 1997. Use of traditional fuels in developing nations would continue to increase, but more slowly than the projected growth in fossil fuel use. Expanding investment in energy supply and conversion is feasible in some countries, but will be difficult in transition and developing nations. These countries need to invest in a broad range of priorities including education, sanitation, health care and rural development. Energy costs are heavier on the individual level in developing and transition countries. Households in developing countries often pay a sizable portion of their income for energy including batteries and fuels and often use these energy sources very 'inefficiently'.

In Ukraine, for example, energy costs account for as much as 40 percent of household expenditures. Environmental contamination can be especially bad in regions with high levels of energy production. Kazakhstan, for example, is a major producer of oil and natural gas, coal, and uranium. But it also has severe air pollution. Soil contamination, and pollution of both surface and ground water. Pollution has severely affected the Caspian Sea and its ecosystems. Khazkhstan faces a public health and ecological crisis due to energy related pollution.

As bad as outdoor air pollution is in many developing countries, indoor air pollution from burning fuelwood and agricultural residues for cooking and heating is an even greater health hazard. In South Africa, rural households that burn wood for cooking and heating exhibit indoor particulate levels 13 times the maximum level recommended by the WHO. According to the WHO and other experts, indoor air pollution is causing about 1.8 million premature deaths annually mainly in women and children (WHO 1997). Fossil fuel intensive energy development over the next century could exacerbate these air quality problems, adversely affecting economic output as well as public health. Nearly half the world’s population lives in rural areas of developing countries, and most of these people do not use electricity or modern cooking fuels. In India for example less than 30 percent of rural households use electricity, over 90 percent use traditional biomass cooking fuels. In many African nations, less than 20 percent of the population has access to electricity (Balu 1997). While hundreds of millions of rural households in developing countries began using electricity and improved their cooking methods between 1970 and 1990, about 2 billion people were without access to electricity or improved cooking methods in 1990 .

Sustainable energy development should provide adequate energy services for satisfying basic human needs, improving social welfare, and achieving economic development throughout the world. But sustainable energy future is only possible through much greater energy efficiency and much greater reliance on renewable energy sources compared to current energy patterns and trends. Greater energy efficiency would reduce growth in energy consumption, decrease investment requirements, and improve energy services in poorer households and nations.

Organization for Economic Coopertion and Development OECD nations are expected to increase their oil import dependence from 54 percent in 1997 to 70 percent in 2020 if current trends are maintained. Also, Asian nations are expected to greatly increase their dependence on imported oil over the next 20 years. The share of world oil supply coming from OPEC nations in the Persian Gulf region increases from 26 percent in 1997 to 41 percent in 2020 in the 2000 World Energy Outlook Reference scenario forecast.

The progress made in reducing overall energy intensity use in eight major OECD countries since 1973 projects a decline of 43 percent in the US, 39 percent in the UK, 24 percent in Japan and 43 percent in Germany. Structural changes such as the shift in economic output from heavy industries to light industries and the services sector caused some of these reductions, but much of the decline was due to real energy efficiency gains (Schipper et al 2001).

Far greater energy savings could be achieved through widespread adoption of commercially available and cost effective energy efficient technologies such as:
- more efficient cooking and water heat8ing devices
- buildings that make better use of natural li8ghting and ventilation
- building that have reflective roofs to reduce their air conditioning load
- compact fluorescent lamps replacing incandescent lamps
- other energy efficient lighting devices
- refrigeration equipment with more efficient compressors and better heat exchangers
- energy management and control systems
- electronic devices with low standby power consumption
- improved design and control of pumping, compressed air, and other motor systems and
- more efficient vehicle engines and drivetrains, lighter weight vehicles, and hybrid electric vehicles.

These are just some of the technologies that can lower the amount of energy consumed for a given task. There are many other options for reducing energy use in applications ranging from washing clothes to operating electronic equipment to manufacturing steel, chemicals, and other basic materials. In addition more intelligent design of new homes, office buildings vehicles, and industrial processes through an integrated systems engineering approach can provide substantial energy savings often with first cost savings as well.


Population growth and life style choice


Many social and cultural developments will affect future energy resources and consumption levels, and consequently the difficulty of achieving a clean energy movement during this century. Population growth and life style choices are two important factors in this regard. Although these factors are normally taken as a given in energy policy analysis, policies to limit population growth world wide and encourage less consumptive life styles could help to facilitate a clean energy mobilization. The world’s population is expected to increase about 50% by 2050 under medium growth assumptions, with almost all the increase expected in developing countries . But population growth could be held to 35 percent during this period if efforts to lower fertility are stepped up. Reducing population growth will facilitate a transition to a substantial future by reducing consumption of energy and other resources. At the same time providing modern energy sources to households now lacking electricity and modern fuels will improve standards of living and help to reduce population growth in developing countries (Reddy 2000). Other policies that can reduce population growth include better health care and education especially of women, expanding family planning services and efforts to convince couples to limit the number of children they have UNFPA 2001. lifestyle affects energy consumption through many choices such as the types of appliances, home, and vehicles families purchase, how they are used, and size, energy consuming devices are proliferating. Personal vehicles that are large and powerful as well as urban sprawl has been continued in many cities. This has caused the growth effect to outstrip the efficiency effect, leading to rising energy consumption and CO2 emissions, in spite of high rates of energy efficiency improvement.

Energy related activities, mainly burning of fossil fuels, produce about 78 percent of humanmade carbon dioxide emissions and about 23 percent of humanmade methane emissions (Holdren and Smith 2000). Carbon dioxide and methane are responsible for about 80 percent of the warming that has occurred since preindustrial times due to emissions of long lived gases. Global warming is starting to have a variety of adverse impacts. These include more frequent and extreme weather events such as droughts, floods, and heat waves, which in turn cause death, property damage, and crop loss. Worldwide economic losses due to extreme weather events increased 10 folds from about $4 billion per year during the 1950s to about $40 billion per year during the 1990s . Global warming also raised the sea level, which adversely affects lowlying island nations and costal areas. If current energy supply and demand trends continue, dramatic global warming will occur during the twenty first century. Worldwide carbon dioxide emissions would increase by a factor of 2 to 2.5 by 2050.

Personal choices can have a significant effect on the total consumption of energy and the rate of energy demand growth. Combating the desire for more consumption of material goods and a bigger is better mentality could play a role in a clean energy outlook. Changing life style choices on a large scale is not simple or easy. Many institutions ranging from business interests, advertising, and popular culture (TV, film, etc) promote consumptive oriented, bigger is better lifestyles. In the US for example a sizable fraction of the public espouses concern for the environment but relatively few people have modified their behaviour or life style in ways that are consistent with these views. Educational efforts, use of role models, as well as more conventional policies such as taxes and financial incentives can influence behavior and life style. At the same time more research is needed concerning the most effective ways to change values and promote lifestyle choices that are more efficient in terms of consumption and more consistent with a sustainable future.