Energy​—Why Essential for Life?

BABY Micah was born in August 2003. A gasoline-powered car rushed his mother to the maternity ward. A coal-burning power station lit the hospital in which he entered the world. A central heating system burning natural gas warmed the room in which he took his first breath. If any one of these traditional power sources had failed, little Micah’s life could have been jeopardized.

The modern civilization into which Micah was born depends on a variety of energy sources for its very existence. Every day we rely on fossil fuels in some way​—to transport us to work, to cook our food, or to light, heat, and cool our homes. The World Resources Institute says that fossil fuels are used to “meet about 90 percent of global commercial-energy demand.” A report published by the Institute in 2000 says: “In energy terms, oil makes the single largest contribution to world energy supply, at 40 percent, followed by coal at 26 percent and natural gas at about 24 percent.”a

The journal Bioscience says: “On average, every year each American uses about 93,000 kilowatt-hours [of power], equivalent to 8000 liters of oil, for all purposes, including transportation, heating, and cooling.” In Australia, China, Poland, and South Africa, more than 75 percent of the electricity used comes from coal-fired generators. India relies on coal for 60 percent of its electric power, while the United States and Germany burn coal to supply more than half their electricity.

“It’s less well known that the world’s food is now nourished by oil,” states journalist Jeremiah Creedon in an article entitled “Life After Oil.” “Petroleum and natural gas are crucial at every step of modern agriculture, from making fertilizer to shipping crops.” (Utne Reader magazine) But how secure are these energy sources from which modern society draws its life and livelihood? Are there any cleaner alternatives available?

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Why the Need for New Power?

“If we think oil is a problem now, just wait 20 years. It’ll be a nightmare.”​—Jeremy Rifkin, Foundation of Economic Trends, Washington, D.C., August 2003.

WITHIN about 20 years​—by that time young Micah would be old enough to drive a car—​worldwide energy consumption “is expected to expand by 58 percent,” claims the U.S. government’s International Energy Outlook 2003 report (IEO2003). New Scientist magazine calls the predicted boom “the biggest surge in energy demand in history.” Can traditional sources of energy safely meet this demand? Consider these sobering facts.

COAL:

◼ Of all the fossil fuels, coal is the most abundant, with enough estimated reserves to last 1,000 years. Globally, coal-fired power stations supply nearly 40 percent of the world’s electricity. Australia is the world’s largest coal exporter, supplying almost a third of all the coal traded worldwide.

Yet, a recent Worldwatch Institute press release states: “Coal is the most carbon-intensive fossil fuel, releasing 29 percent more carbon per unit of energy than oil, and 80 percent more than natural gas. It accounts for 43 percent of annual global carbon emissions​—approximately 2.7 billion tons.” Aside from its environmental impact, what effect can coal burning have on human health? To cite one example, a recent United Nations Global Environment Outlook report stated: “In China, smoke and small particles from burning coal cause more than 50 000 premature deaths and 400 000 new cases of chronic bronchitis a year in 11 of its large cities.”

OIL:

◼ The world already consumes 75 million barrels of oil a day. Of the world’s total oil reserves, which are estimated to have been some 2 trillion barrels in volume, approximately 900 billion barrels have already been consumed. At present production rates, oil supplies are predicted to last another 40 years.

However, geologists Colin J. Campbell and Jean H. Laherrère claimed in 1998: “Within the next decade, the supply of conventional oil will be unable to keep up with demand.” These oil-industry experts warned: “Conventional wisdom erroneously assumes that the last bucket of oil can be pumped from the ground just as quickly as the barrels of oil gushing from wells today. In fact, the rate at which any well​—or any country—​can produce oil always rises to a maximum and then, when about half the oil is gone, begins falling gradually back to zero. From an economic perspective, when the world runs completely out of oil is thus not directly relevant: what matters is when production begins to taper off.”

When is oil production expected to taper off? Petroleum geologist Joseph Riva says that “planned oil production expansions . . . are less than half that needed to meet the 2010 world oil demand projected by IEA [International Energy Agency].” New Scientist warns: “If production rates fall while demand continues to rise, oil prices are likely to spike or fluctuate wildly, raising the prospect of economic chaos, problems with transporting food and other supplies, and even war as countries fight over what little oil is available.”

While some analysts see dwindling oil supplies as a problem, others feel that the end of our dependence on oil cannot come quickly enough. Writing in Utne Reader, Jeremiah Creedon says: “The only thing worse than running out of oil might be not running out of oil. The carbon dioxide we create by burning oil continues to heat the planet, yet the economy and the environment are still usually discussed as separate issues.” Highlighting the consequences of just one country’s addiction to oil, the Australian Broadcasting Commission reports: “The 26 million vehicles in the United Kingdom generate one third of all the UK’s carbon dioxide (which leads to global warming) and one third of all the UK’s air pollution (which kills around 10,000 people each year).”

NATURAL GAS:

◼ Over approximately the next 20 years, “natural gas is projected to be the fastest growing primary energy source worldwide,” states the IEO2003 report. Natural gas is the cleanest burning of the fossil fuels, and it is thought that the earth holds vast reserves of natural gas.

However, “no one really knows exactly how much natural gas exists until it is extracted,” states the Washington, D.C.-based Natural Gas Supply Association. “Each estimate is based on a different set of assumptions . . . It is thus difficult to get a definitive answer to the question of how much natural gas exists.”

Methane is the primary component of natural gas, and methane is “a very potent greenhouse gas. In fact, methane has an ability to trap heat almost 21 times more effectively than carbon dioxide,” states the previously quoted association. Nevertheless, this source says that a major study performed by the Environmental Protection Agency and the Gas Research Institute “concluded that the reduction in emissions from increased natural gas use strongly outweighs the detrimental effects of increased methane emissions.”

ATOMIC ENERGY:

◼ “Some 430 nuclear reactors supply about 16 per cent of the world’s electricity,” reports Australian Geographic. In addition to these existing reactors, the IEO2003 report says: “As of February 2003, the nations of developing Asia accounted for 17 of the 35 reactors currently under construction worldwide.”

Dependence on nuclear power persists despite the possibility of disasters, such as that experienced in 1986 at Chernobyl, in the former Soviet Union. New Scientist reports that “America’s existing reactors are being plagued by cracks and corrosion” and that in March 2002, the Davis-Besse reactor in Ohio “came close to a catastrophic meltdown” as a result of corrosion problems.

Given the limited supply of and inherent dangers in existing energy sources, the question arises, Is mankind doomed to ruin the earth in their quest to feed their seemingly insatiable thirst for energy? It is obvious that we need clean, reliable alternatives. Are such alternatives both available and affordable?

What New Developments in Energy?

WIND:

◼ Mankind has long harnessed the power of the wind to propel sailing ships, turn grinding mills, and pump water. In recent years, though, enthusiasm for wind power has swept the globe. High-tech windmills now generate enough nonpolluting, renewable power worldwide to provide electricity for 35 million people. Denmark already generates 20 percent of its electricity from wind power alone. Germany, Spain, and India are rapidly adopting wind power, with India claiming the fifth-largest wind power capacity in the world. The United States currently has 13,000 windmills generating electricity. And some analysts claim that if all the suitable sites in the United States were developed, that country could generate more than 20 percent of its current electric needs from the wind.

SUN:

◼ Man-made photovoltaic cells convert sunlight into electricity when the sun’s rays excite electrons in the cells. Worldwide, nearly 500 million watts of electricity are produced by this method, and the market for solar cells is growing at 30 percent per year. At present, though, photovoltaic cells are relatively inefficient, and the electricity produced from the cells is expensive when compared with that produced from fossil fuels. In addition, toxic chemicals, such as cadmium sulfide and gallium arsenide, are used in the cells’ manufacture. Because such chemicals persist in the environment for centuries, notes Bioscience, “disposal and recycling of the materials in inoperative cells could become a major problem.”

GEOTHERMAL ENERGY:

◼ If a person were to dig a hole in the earth’s crust toward its hot core, which is an estimated 7,000 degrees Fahrenheit [4,000°C], the temperature would increase, on average, by about 90 degrees Fahrenheit for every mile [30 degrees Celsius for every kilometer] dug. However, for people who live close to thermal springs or volcanic fissures, the earth’s heat is more readily available. Hot water or steam produced by hot spots in the earth’s crust is used in 58 countries to heat homes or generate electricity. Iceland satisfies about half its energy needs by harnessing geothermal power. Other countries, such as Australia, are looking into tapping the energy trapped in large areas of hot, dry rock buried just a few miles beneath the earth’s surface. Australian Geographic reports: “Some researchers believe that by pumping water down to that trapped heat and then using the hot water to turn turbines as it returns to the surface under very high pressure, we could generate power for decades​—even centuries.”

WATER:

◼ Hydroelectric power plants already supply over 6 percent of the world’s energy needs. According to the International Energy Outlook 2003 report, over the next two decades, “much of the growth in renewable energy sources will result from large-scale hydroelectric power projects in the developing world, particularly among the nations of developing Asia.” However, Bioscience warns: “The impounded water frequently covers valuable, agriculturally productive, alluvial bottomland. Furthermore, dams alter the existing plants, animals, and microbes in the ecosystem.”

HYDROGEN:

◼ Hydrogen is a colorless, odorless, combustible gas and is the most abundant element in the universe. On earth, hydrogen is an integral part of plant and animal tissue, is bound up in fossil fuels, and is one of the two components that form water. In addition, hydrogen burns more cleanly and more efficiently than fossil fuels.

The journal Science News Online states that water “can [be] split into hydrogen and oxygen when electricity passes through it.” While this method could produce abundant amounts of hydrogen, the journal notes that “this seemingly straightforward process isn’t yet economical.” Factories already produce some 45 million tons of hydrogen globally, mainly for use in fertilizers and cleaning agents. But this hydrogen is extracted in a process involving fossil fuels​—a process that also gives off the poisonous gas carbon monoxide and the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide.

Still, many see hydrogen as the most promising of the alternative fuels and feel it is capable of satisfying mankind’s future energy needs. This optimism is based on recent dramatic improvements in a device known as the fuel cell.

FUEL-CELL POWER:

◼ A fuel cell is a device that produces electricity from hydrogen​—not by burning it, but by combining it with oxygen during a controlled chemical reaction. When pure hydrogen is used rather than a hydrogen-rich fossil fuel, the only by-products of the reaction are heat and water.

In 1839, Sir William Grove, a British judge and physicist, developed the first fuel cell. However, fuel cells were expensive to build, and the fuel and components were awkward to obtain. Thus, the technology lay dormant until the mid-20th century when fuel cells were developed to provide power for American spaceships. Modern spacecraft still use fuel cells to provide onboard power, but the technology is now being refined for more down-to-earth uses.

Today, fuel cells are being developed to replace the internal combustion engine in motor vehicles, to provide electricity for commercial and domestic buildings, and to power small electric devices, such as mobile phones and computers. Even so, at the time of writing, the power generated from existing stationary fuel-cell plants is more than four times as expensive as that from fossil fuel sources. Still, hundreds of millions of dollars are being invested in developing this emerging technology.

The environmental benefits of adopting cleaner energy sources are obvious. However, the cost of doing so on a large scale is likely to remain prohibitive. The IEO2003 report says: “Much of the increment in future energy demand . . . is projected to be for fossil fuels (oil, natural gas, and coal), because it is expected that fossil fuel prices will remain relatively low, and that the cost of generating energy from other fuels will not be competitive.”

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Fuel-cell vehicle, 2004

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Mercedes-Benz USA

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DOE Photo

Finding the Source of All Energy

THE sun is the earth’s primary energy source. Many scientists believe that coal and oil are the decayed remains of trees and plants that drew their energy from the sun.a The water that flows into hydroelectric dams is initially drawn from the oceans by heat from the sun and is transported overland in the form of clouds. The sun’s warming rays also propel the breezes that drive wind-powered generators. Yet, it is estimated that only about half a billionth of the sun’s energy reaches the earth.

Although awesome in power, the star we know as the sun is just one among billions of similar massive sources of energy in the universe. What is the ultimate origin of all this power? Referring to the stars, the Bible writer Isaiah says: “Raise your eyes high up and see. Who has created these things? It is the One who is bringing forth the army of them even by number, all of whom he calls even by name. Due to the abundance of dynamic energy, he also being vigorous in power, not one of them is missing.”​—Isaiah 40:26.

When contemplating the sheer power of the stars, we may feel overwhelmed​—and even more so when we consider their Creator. However, the Bible encourages us: “Draw close to God, and he will draw close to you.” (James 4:8) Yes, the Creator of the earth and its abundant energy resources, the one who gave us the spark of life, can be found by those who look for him.​—Genesis 2:7; Psalm 36:9.

When they see the earth and its resources being polluted and distributed unfairly, some people may find it hard to believe that God is interested in the earth and the individuals upon it. Nevertheless, the Bible assures us that change is soon to come, promising a major change in both the way the world’s resources are distributed and the way the earth itself is governed. (Daniel 2:44; Matthew 6:9, 10) By installing one heavenly global government under the direction of his Son, Christ Jesus, Jehovah God will ensure that everyone living will share the earth’s abundant resources fairly. (Micah 4:2-4) He will also “bring to ruin those ruining the earth,” that is, those who corrupt the earth’s environment, whether in a spiritual or a physical way.​—Revelation 11:18.

At that time the promise recorded at Isaiah 40:29-31 will prove true both spiritually and physically: “He is giving to the tired one power; and to the one without dynamic energy he makes full might abound. Boys will both tire out and grow weary, and young men themselves will without fail stumble, but those who are hoping in Jehovah will regain power. They will mount up with wings like eagles. They will run and not grow weary; they will walk and not tire out.” You too can learn more about the Source of all energy and the solution to earth’s energy problems if you take time to study the Bible.

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