energy challenges and dilemmas

• primary energy consists of unconverted or original fuels e.g petroleum, natural gas, coal, biomass, flowing water, wind, and solar radiation
• secondary energy is resources that has been converted or stored to produce energy e.g liquid fuels like gasoline and diesel (refined oils), electricity, and heat
• critical energy is sustainable energy from forests, plants, and other biomass. they may be overused such as depleting faster than they can be produced
• non critical energy is everlasting resources such as tides, waves, running water, wind, and solar power
• commercial energy is energy which is available to the users at some price e.g coal, petroleum, natural gas, and electricity
• non commercial energy is energy that is free of cost to users e.g fire wood, agricultural waste, cow dung
• key characteristics of coal

  • dirty bulky difficult to transport
  • traditional market domestic heating and railways
  • used for generation of electricity in thermal power stations to melt melt and raw material in chemical industry
• key characteristics of petroleum

  • cheap and flexible
  • refined and used for transport
  • raw material in petrochemical industry
  • submarine oil fields contribute large proportion of supply
• key characteristics of natural gas

  • most flexible and clean
  • domestic and industrial uses
  • transported to consumers through a direct pipeline
  • can be transported by sea in liquefied form lpg
• key characteristics of nuclear

  • clean used for electricity generation
  • most associated with HDE
  • expensive to ensure safety
  • potential to combat climate change
• key locations of coal

  • 30n and 60n stretching across north america and eurasia 70% of earths coal
  • very little mined in southern hemisphere
  • china biggest producer and consumer
• key trends of coal

  • declining use in older industrial countries europe and japan
  • increasing use in eastern europe and russia
  • significant increase china and india
• key locations of petroleum

  • opec memebers produced 75% middle east
  • caspian sea large reserves
  • large reserves in mainland and offshore mexico
  • 1973 oil crisis made previously uneconomic sources viable in environmentally difficult areas
• key trends of petroleum

  • caspian sea production significant but not major
  • notwithstanding the collapse of oil prices artic ocean and south atlantic could be an exploration bonza for the future
  • fracking new potentially abundant source of once natural gas is condensed into oil
• key locations of natural gas

  • leading producers china canada russia and usa
  • caspian sea region significant but not major
• key trends of natural gas

  • production increased very quickly
  • european notable but declining
  • fracking abundant source
• key location of nuclear

  • kazakhstan produces over 40% world uranium
  • usa produces most nuclear energy 1/5 of their energy demand
• key trends of nuclear:

  • nuclear electricity generation increased tenfold globally between 1960-1970
  • EME rapidly developing the technology
  • china alone could build 300 more stations by 2050
• energy mix is the composition of different primary energy sources from which households and industries get their energy