Energy-efficiency has become the talk of the town. Scientists, marketers, journalists, and politicians alike are showering praises on the new technologies that promise to revolutionize our planet. From "zero-emission" electric cars, to smart electric grids, to "green" laptops, high-tech "sustainable" solutions seem to promise the world a brighter future (1). It’s a positive message at heart: to solve the world’s energy problems, all we need is better engineering. And with many prototypes near completion, who wouldn’t be excited?
The economists aren’t, for one. These contrarians are quick to point out that most attempts towards energy-efficient technology have proved utterly futile. History has repeatedly shown that energy-efficiency rarely leads to net energy reduction. In fact, quite frequently, efficiency improvements makes things worse by actually encouraging a net waste in energy. This counter-intuitive effect is known as the Jevons Paradox.
This energy-efficiency paradox was first described in the mid-1800s by a British economist named William Stanley Jevons. During this era, coal was the fuel that powered industrialization in Britain. Britain was blessed with this valuable resource: geologists estimated that it had around 90 billion tons of natural coal reserves (2). This ample supply of cheap energy provided the power for the nation’s vast array of steam engines. These engines, in turn, powered the manufacturing industries that made the British Empire wealthy.
Over time, Britain’s economy became increasingly dependent on coal. Since 1770, the amount of coal being consumed each year was growing exponentially. Assuming continued exponential growth, England would exhaust its vast coal reserves in the next 100 years–no...
... middle of paper ...
...ters encourage people to leave these systems on longer. Lower costs might even encourage the average home-buyer to purchase a larger house. Any potential savings are thus wasted cooling and heating extra space (6).
The Jevons Paradox makes it clear that technology by itself can’t solve our present energy crisis. If new innovations aren’t accompanied by a cultural shift towards conservation, they are likely to waste more energy than ever before.
The trouble with sustainable living is that it requires a total lifestyle change. Life apart from consumerism can be difficult to imagine, so we resist. It’s much easier to just keep searching for the next big thing. We want to be environmentally-friendly, but we don’t want to give up our cheap energy, shopping sprees, fast cars, quick profits, and junk food. So we’ll be sure to see plenty of paradoxes for years to come.
Coal in the 1930’s: The First Lame Duck? European Union. 2002. Great Sutton Street, London. .
The Industrial Revolution was not only a turning point in the progress of human history, but the start of a great change in the Earth’s environment. Technological advances in industry and mass migration into urban areas led to a rising demand for energy sources, a demand met by fossil fuels. Casper, J. (2010) describes coal as ‘symbolic of the beginning of the Industrial Revolution’, the increased combustion of these ‘dirty’ fossil fuels further polluted the air and enhanced the volume of Carbon Dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere. Changes in land use attributed to population rise, reduced the amount of photosynthesising biomass on Earth, diminished an important ‘carbon sink’ and concluded to enhance the Greenhouse Effect.
Coal is considerably one of the most important sources of energy in nature and is one the most significant sources for power generation worldwide. The excavation and importance of coal became mainstream and apparent during the Industrial Revolution of the 19th and 20th centuries.
Sustainability is one of the most controversial topics throughout the history, and as our society develop, we realize that being able to be sustainable is essential to survival of our race. The book Taking Sides: Clashing Views in Sustainability is a collection of articles on different side of various issues related to sustainability. In the book, Issue 8 discusses the ability of technology to deliver sustainability, and issue 16 and 17 discusses the sustainability of food and energy. While issue 16 and 17 are well-presented, the arguments in issue 8 are not very strong.
Generational conflicts, political strife, environmental regulations, stakeholders in big oil, and many more hurdles affect the push to fully sustainable economies around the world and even here in America. In a world where coal, oil, and natural gas are limited, countries are gobbling it all up as fast as they can before other poorer countries come on the grid. Even though America and other countries gobble up these resources the life of the people is still a struggle to meet basic needs. Sustainability is an intermingling of resource use and protection of the “quality of life”, it is met by using resources sparingly and by recycling or reducing the use of other non-renewable resources to provide for our immediate need, but also to conserve and protect the needs of the next generation and to improve the quality of all the lives to come.
Based on Laurel Nesbit, a program assistant in the Office of Sustainability here at UF, our campus manages to utilize 470,000 Megawatts of energy annually. This figure is generated from all the energy-consuming gadgets that operate on our campus on a daily bases. These gadgets include computers that are left turned on over the night even they are not in use, copiers, and the fume hoods in our laboratories. Admittedly, the success and the health of wellbeing of the students is contingent upon some of these equipment. For instance, the laboratories need the fume hoods in order to keep the experimenters safe. Instead of casting these necessities away, we can develop alternatives which will be capable of generating energy in order to compensate for the electricity that we endlessly
The greatest impact on reducing dependence on fossil fuels could begin at home. All around us are devices that consume energy even as we do nothing with them. Known colloquially as “vampire power”, these devices in standby power mode continue to consume energy as they are never actually “off”. Studies by Ross and Meier (2001) have shown that the average household can have up to 40 different devices consuming energy, from clocks to microwaves and DVD players to television, these devices add up to, between, 5% and 26% of the total electricity consumption in a household – energy likely produced at the cost of burning fossil fuels, both in production of the electricity and the transportation of the fuels themselves.
Hirsch, Sven, and Cornelia Daheim. "The Meaning Of Clean Electricity." World Future Review (World Future Society) 4.2 (2012): 96-101. Academic Search Complete. Web. 6 Feb. 2014.
Using coal is one of the most historical ways to generate electricity around worldwide. According to the book Your World in Motion: The Story of Energy by George Barrow, the author stated that the first time people used thermal power by coal was at north train station Paris in 1875. The technology of the generators, the manufacturing of steam turbines and the power transmissions has been improved step...
Great Britain’s natural resources were a major factor in its early industrialization. One of the main resources was the abundance of both coal and iron. These two elements could be easily used in many different aspects of industrialization, and the amount of each led innovators to use them in all aspects of manufacturing in order to lower costs. Due
The year is 2200. The world is going through a fossil fuel shortage. Oil reserves are almost completely consumed and it is becoming impossible to find new fossil fuel sources. Not prepared for this event to occur, The United States, has no alternative options. As a result of the oil shortage, the standard of living deteriorates. Heat in homes, supermarkets full of food, and transportation, all basic necessities taken for granted, will be depleted because fossil fuels are used to power almost everything. The key to the prevention of this future is renewable energy. Unfortunately the support for the use of renewable energy is weak and ineffective. Unless the US puts forth effort to research and promote the use of renewable energy to consumers, conversion from fossil fuels to renewable energy will no longer be an option.
Buildings and the appliances alone account for 40 percent of America 's energy use and a third of our global warming emissions (NRDC). New buildings will need to meet new energy-efficiency standards that maximize energy savings and existing homes and commercial spaces can be improved to save energy through weatherizing and installing energy efficient heating, cooling and lighting systems. Ultimately, this will not only be energy efficient but also cost effective as well. In the bigger picture, retrofitting just 1 out of every 5 homes would avoid the need to build 13 mid-sized power plants every year. Retrofitting every house in the country would cut as much global warming pollution as taking a half a million cars off the road – and would save more oil and gas than we could extract from drilling in our coastal waters (NRDC). In the long run, creating more efficient communities through homes and buildings, we could cut back on the global warming issues we are dealing
Although more people are aware of the impacts we have on our environment, there are still people that choose to ignore scientific evidence, or do not fully understand the consequences. Further education and research are critical components in an effort to become more sustainable. Fortunately, younger generations are learning about the need to address environmental issues so that changes can be made to ensure our way of life is sustainable.
...g the Energy Revolution." Foreign Affairs. Nov/Dec 2010: 111. SIRS Issues Researcher. Web. 21 Nov 2011.
Bode, H. (2005). Sustainable Development and Innovation in the Energy Sector. New York: Amherst International.