Millennium Project
Global Challenges Facing Humanity
13. Energy
How can growing energy demand be met safely and efficiently?

The options to create and update global energy strategies are too complex and rapidly changing for decisionmakers to make coherent policy. Yet the environmental and social consequences of incoherent policy are so serious that a new global system for collective intelligence is justified. Such a system has to be designed so that it can be understood and used by the general public, politicians, and non-scientists, as well as by leading scientists and engineers around the world.

As the two great energy consumers and CO2 producers, the U.S. and China should lead an “Apollo-like” global energy R&D program with a full range of possibilities—from a solar-electric economy that is both land- and space-based to massive biofuels and tele-work efficiencies cutting demand. Initial U.S.-China cooperation has begun on cleaner coal processing and biofuels. Energy efficiencies will increase and will lower demand in richer areas—it takes 33% less energy today than in 1973 to produce a unit of GDP in IEA countries, but demand in other areas like China and India will push global demand over 50% from 2003 to 2030, increasing fossil fuel consumption to 81% of primary energy demand unless alternatives succeed. In the meantime, large-scale carbon capture, storage, and reuse should also be a top priority. Over $70 billion was invested into renewable and low-carbon technology in 2006, up 43% since 2005; 1,500 clean tech companies opened; and 4,093 U.S. patents focused on clean tech, with solar and biofuels leading.

Research is increasingly showing that solar energy can become a major source of electricity and that biomass could increasingly replace petroleum if environmental pollution and food prices are not raised too much. Massive seawater irrigation employing halophyte plants and algae on coastal deserts could annually produce 190,000 liters of biofuels per hectare. Cogeneration using waste heat can also make contributions to energy production. Meanwhile, approximately 1,000 coal plants, with production lives of 40 years, are in some stage of planning or construction around the world without CO2 capture. Emissions from coal-fired power plants projected to be built over the next 25 years are greater than total emissions during the last 250 years. Environmental movements may try to close down fossil fuel industries, just as they stopped growth in nuclear energy 30 years ago. For nuclear energy to replace the greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuels, about 2,000 nuclear power plants would have to be built—two to three a week for 15 years. Another Chernobyl-type accident could halt expansion of nuclear power.

Nanotubes may replace wire to conduct electricity better. Solar farms can focus sunlight atop towers with sterling and other generators. Plastic nanotech photovoltaics printed on buildings and other surfaces could cut costs and increase efficiency. Estimates for the potential of wind energy continue to increase. The transition to a hydrogen infrastructure may be too expensive and too late to affect climate change, while plug-in hybrids and flex-fuel vehicles, falling battery costs, and compressed air cars may provide alternatives sooner to petroleum-only vehicles. Learning how C hydrogenoformans bacteria convert water and carbon monoxide to hydrogen could lead to a breakthrough in sustainable hydrogen production. Space solar power satellites could manage base-load electricity on a global basis, improving efficiencies and beaming energy to electric grids, providing sustainable abundant electricity for the world. Agreement on scientific measurements will be necessary for energy pricing policies and carbon taxes to reflect the impacts of energy production and use. All these may require the creation of a World Energy Organization.

Challenge 13 will be addressed seriously when the total energy production from environmentally benign processes surpasses other sources for five years in a row, with atmospheric CO2 additions also dropping for at least five years, and when the worldwide expenditures for energy R&D increase by a factor of five from today’s expenditures.

Regional Considerations

Africa: Africa produces 30% of China’s imported oil. It has substantial renewable energy resources, with more than 3,140 terawatt-hours of exploitable technical hydropower potential, more than 9,000 megawatts of geothermal potential, abundant biomass potential, substantial solar potential, and in some countries significant wind potential. Nevertheless, renewable sources contribute less than 1% of the region’s primary energy supply.

Asia and Oceania: Low-cost Chinese batteries may make electric cars affordable very soon. Even though China has reduced the energy per GDP by 50% since 1991, its CO2 emissions passed the U.S. in 2006. China is the second largest oil consumer and plans to nearly quadruple its nuclear capacity by 2020. Two-thirds of China’s energy comes from coal—making China a critical player in any carbon sequestration strategy. The Philippines gets 27% of its electricity from geothermal sources. Japan and South Korea import nearly all their energy. Japan is studying how to process solar energy in orbit and beam it to electric power grids on Earth, and it plans to have 5 million fuel cell cars by 2020. Australia plans to outlaw incandescent light bulbs by 2010 in favor of compact fluorescent bulbs.

Europe: The EU plans that biofuels will account for 10% of its fuels by 2020 and that the region will bring GHG emissions at least 20% below 1990 levels. A U.S.-EU summit agreed to establish a network of 12 carbon-capture-and-storage demonstration plants by 2015. Wind is expected to deliver 23% of Europe’s electricity by 2030. Europe’s increasing dependence on Russian energy gives Russia a new diplomatic tool. Sweden aims to become a fossil-fuel-free economy by 2020. Germany produces half the world’s solar electricity, is Europe’s largest biodiesel producer, and plans to cut CO2 emissions by 40% by 2020, making Germany the world’s most energy-efficient country.

Latin America: Brazil is the world leader in ethanol production; 70% of its car purchases were flex-fuel vehicles in 2006; its ethanol exports could be $1.3 billion in 2010. Bolivia and Venezuela continue to nationalize their oil and gas industries. Mexico is unwilling to have foreign investment develop its natural gas but lacks the domestic funds to do it. Venezuela’s heavy oil reserves could use today’s technologies, giving it larger reserves than Saudi Arabia.

North America: Given 15-year car-fleet turnover, half the new cars in the U.S. by 2012 have to be gasoline-independent to cut Middle East oil dependence over the next 20–30 years, which could be done by flex-fuel plug-in hybrids. Space solar power could supply all electric car requirements worldwide. For nuclear energy to replace CO2-emitting U.S. power plants, about 350 nuclear plants would have to be constructed—a new plant every two or three weeks for 15 years. The U.S. Department of Energy finds that “off-peak” electricity production and transmission capacity could fuel 84% of the country’s 220 million vehicles if they were plug-in hybrid electrics. Currently the U.S. wastes 2.3 billion gallons of gas per year in traffic jams. The U.S. plans to build a demonstration “zero-emissions” coal-fired power plant and hydrogen production facility with integrated carbon capture and sequestration. Gasoline tax in the U.S. is roughly one-seventh as much as in Europe.

Graph: World Total Primary Energy Supply

Source: IEA, Key World Energy Statistics 2006


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