Sustainable Energy Sources Match Growing Population

Can these sustainable energy sources match the ever growing population and its relative demand?
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Introduction
Recently, a study by Abelard Organization (2016) shows that there has been an exponential growth in population which has led to a drastic rise in energy demand. As most of the energy is sourced from nuclear reactors, diesel, and hydraulic generators, this exploitation has proven unclean and not safe for the environment. Also, due to the population increase, the demand for energy is strained to lead to over-exploitation of energy resources. This requirement has resulted in the questioning of whether alternative sources can be used instead of fossil energy. Can these sustainable energy sources match the ever growing population and its relative demand? This paper is going to shade light on the various areas as pertained to energy sources, the pros and cons of dirty energy, their effects on the environment, the advantages of clean sources, impacts on the economy and whether their sustainability can match the ever increasing trend of population growth and its relative demand.
Historical perspective
Fossil fuel has been in use for over 3000 years ago where coal from the Fu-shun mine in northeastern China may have been used to smelt copper. Coal is also found in most of the lower US states and throughout the globe. Oil has also been used for over 6,000 years, from the ancient Sumerians, Assyrians, and Babylonian ages. Also in North America, Oil was used as medicine and making canoes waterproof. As the US grew, the demand for oil increased gradually as a fuel for lamps. Petroleum oil replaced whale oil in lamps since the price of whale oil was high. In these days, most of the petroleum oil was obtained from the distillation of coal into liquid just as done by the native Americans.
In 1959, Edwin Drake struck liquid oil under the ground and devised a way that could pump it up to the surface in Titusville, Pennsylvania. The oil was pumped into barrels made of wood. In the US, much as we produce our oil, over 50% percent of oil comes from outside the country precisely the Middle East (California Energy Commission, 2012).
Over the years the increase in energy demand has simultaneously grown with the growth in pollution. This increase has led to over-exploitation and exhaustion of energy resources especially the fossil energy (Zabel,2009). Due to this exploitation, companies have opted for more reserves in other depleted resources such as oil which has also put pressure on the natural resources causing adverse environmental impacts. Due to the growing needs created by industrialization many countries, including the USA have felt the strain on natural resources. An instance is whereby the USA is approximated to use over 20 percent of the world’s energy, while its population is 5% percent of the global population (Fisher, 2012). A lot of effort has been made towards the use of alternative energy but still the question of sustainability and demand remains.
According to Howarth (2014), shale and the conventional natural gas produce more greenhouse gas than that of coal or oil more so during residential and commercial heating. The most prevalent of all is methane which has been stipulated as the most dangerous fuel that has a greater influence on global warming for the past few decades. Howarth (2016) also goes ahead to say that the society should desist the use of all fossil fuel and should not believe that natural gas can be acceptably substituted for a sustainable future.
Benefits and limitations
The continued use of fossil energy poses a significant threat to the environment and health. Much as there are campaigns to desecrate the constant use of fossil energy, the availability of a substantial alternative source of energy is becoming problematic. On the issue of sustainability, population growth is on the increase, and this causes an outcry over the continued exploitation of dirty energy. Most individual have opted for cleaner energy. But is this energy able to supplement the fossil energy already in use? Our continued reliance on the fossil energy especially oil and natural gas in both domestic and commercial purposes is coming to haunt us. Much as we may blame the continued use of fossil energy and natural gas as to depleting the atmosphere and degrading the environment, we have yet to actualize how clean energy can be utilized in the place of the dirty energy (Jacobson, et al., 2015).
Fossil fuel is the highest consumed fuel in the world today. Actually, it is a man’s best friend. It is readily available due to the advancement in technology of this kind of fuel’s refinery and extraction. This fuel also produces a higher amount of energy due to their ease in combustion as compared to other sources. Fossil fuel also has a high calorific power value which makes it among the most efficient and preferable kind of energy over the other renewable sources. Fossil fuels are also stable thereby easy to store, and they do not form any compounds emanating from lengthier storage. It is also easily transported from place to place wherever they are needed. This kind of fuel is also available in abundance even though there has been a lot of effort to popularize alternative sources of energy and these fuels are also cheaply available since their methods of extraction are not cheap (Abelard Organization, 2016).
The sustainability question
Recently, sustainability as a measure has been particularly concerned with global warming and many aspects, as compared to the past thoughts which were regarding availability about the rate of use. Other concerns have involved the effects of energy sources to the environment and also the question of wastes, despite whether they have, or don't have environmental effects. Safety has also been another major concern as well as the uncovered for an aspect of maximizing the available options for future generations. On the forefront of energy policy has been the criteria used for sustainable development. This agenda has been influenced by climate change concerns that have been increased by the enhancement of the greenhouse effect by humans. The interest has made the baseline on how we should address the energy sustainability according to human needs.
Early as 1972, a group of professionals warned the world that the consistent and the exponential increase of energy rising consumption was not environmentally sustainable. Later was forced a zero-growth scenario for a few years which was influenced by the economic factors. Oil prices multiplied during the oil crisis of 1973-74 due to the Yom Kippur war whereby the OPEC (Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries) cartel cut off oil supply dramatically.This crisis caused a decline in OPEC production of oil while countries out of the OPEC cartel continued with their rise in production (BP, 2005).
Also, other scenarios have been enacted with the aim of sustainable trends. In 1995, Shell International Petroleum published two suppository scenarios namely ‘Sustained Growth’ and ‘Dematerialisation’ which envisaged an evolutionary progress from coal to gas then later to renewables which included nuclear energy. These were then changed to further long-term scenarios: ‘Dynamics as Usual’ and ‘Spirit of the Coming Age’ which was more of radical. It was the idea of mounting new technological systems that were based on hydrogen, with the help of developments in fuel cells and complete withdrawal of Carbon dioxide. The system is known widely as the Hydrogen Economy (Shell International, 2001). Both scenarios were aimed at showing and advocating for a gradual decline in fossil fuel which will apparently cause pollution.
Energy demand trends
Population growth
Population growth has been determined by technological advances, medical and public health improvement, hygiene and sanitation, increase in agricultural productivity and food availability. There is no mention of high energy sources much as energy sources have played a role in the above factors.
As population increases, there is more consumption of energy. This availability of energy also leads to population growth. This increase in consumption power pressures demands on energy sources making them rare and insufficient. These leads to more and more mining of coal, drilling for oil and depletion of forests. Power supply extraction declines gradually leading to exploitation of new sources. We call this the cycle of dependency.
Oil and Coal have remained the primary energy sources with coal increasing its share significantly since the year 2000. In 2005, the growth slowed, and the total share of fossil fuels dropped to 81% from a high of 86% in 1971. This increase excludes wind, solar, geothermal, bioenergy, biofuels and as well as nontraded biomass (IEA, 2006).
Figure: World primary energy consumption by fuel type
Most of this energy trends have been seen in industrialized countries which have heavily relied on the ready availability of energy. On an economic basis, people in these societies presently use over 100 fold the quantity of energy their ancestors had used before humans learned to exploit the energy potential of fire (United Nations Development Programme, 2000). The forms of energy from fossil fuel has grown even faster while non-renewable, carbon-emitting fossil fuels supply approximately 80% of the world's primary energy needs.
In this steady increase rate, the overall energy use will continue growing steadily and may double or even triple by 2050. From a sustainability perspective, the consumption of fossil fuel will increase strongly as population increases with energy consumption. This increase means that there will be a continuation of fossil fuel dominance on the overall supply. However, to interfere with the present trajectory, governments, businesses and individuals all over the globe will be required to combine concerted efforts rapidly to increase other historical trends towards higher efficiency and lower-carbon energy sources.
Economic growth
The economy depends on energy where an increase in the consumption of energy leads to a decrease in economy. Conservation policies may result in adverse effects on the economy of a country if implemented. A c...