Analysis Of Energy Use Research Articles

Analysis of Energy Use and Input Costs for Irrigation in Field Crop Production: A Case Study for the Konya Plain of Turkey

The objective of this study was to determine the energy use and input costs for irrigation in field crop production of winter wheat, maize, sugar beet, dry bean, potato, and carrot. For this purpose, irrigation data for the production of six field crops were collected through a survey of 72 farms. According to the results, the carrot crop used the highest amount of energy for irrigation with a value of 47,655 MJ/ha, and winter wheat used the least at 13,167 MJ/ha. Energy efficiency of irrigation for carrot, sugar beet, dry bean, potato, maize, and winter wheat were estimated to be 3.19, 6.04, 1.11, 2.69, 6.41, and 3.95, respectively. The most important cost item for irrigation was the diesel energy cost. The farms that used electricity for irrigation were more successful in terms of economic performance. It was concluded that excess water and energy use for the irrigation process should be reduced to increase the efficiency of energy use for the production of field crops in arid and semi-arid areas.

Final energy use in IEA countries: The role of energy efficiency

Improved energy efficiency is a key policy goal of all International Energy Agency (IEA) member countries, but tracking energy efficiency gains is not straightforward. As part of its contribution to the G8 Gleneagles Plan of Action, the IEA has been developing in-depth indicators—tools that provide data and analysis of energy use and efficiency trends. This paper gives an overview of the IEA indicator methodology and presents examples of how disaggregated indicators can be used to identify the factors that drive and restrain energy demand at the end-use level. A decomposition approach is also used to separate efficiency effects from the impacts of structure and activity. The results clearly show the important role that energy efficiency has played in shaping trends in final energy use in IEA countries for more than 30 years. However, the analysis also reveals that recent gains in energy efficiency have been much lower than in earlier decades. Accelerating energy efficiency improvements is therefore a crucial challenge for IEA governments and indicators have an important role to play in helping to develop and evaluate the policies that will be required.

Energy use by Eem Neanderthals

An analysis of energy use by Neanderthals in Northern Europe during the mild Eem interglacial period is carried out with consideration of the metabolic energy production required for compensating energy losses during sleep, at daily settlement activities and during hunting expeditions, including transport of food from slain animals back to the settlement. Additional energy sources for heat, security and cooking are derived from fireplaces in the open or within shelters such as caves or huts. The analysis leads to insights not available from archaeological findings that are mostly limited to durable items such as those made of stone: Even during the benign Eem period, Neanderthals faced a considerable heat-loss problem. Wearing tailored clothes or some similar measure was necessary for survival. An animal skin across the shoulder would not have sufficed to survive even average cold winter temperatures and body cooling by convection caused by wind. Clothes and particularly footwear had to be sewn together tightly in order to prevent intrusion of water or snow. The analysis of hunting activity evolvement in real time further shows that during summer warmth, transport of meat back to the base settlement would not be possible without some technique to avoid that the meat rots. The only likely technique is meat drying at the killing site, which indicates further skills in Neanderthal societies that have not been identified by other routes of investigation.

Well-To-Wheels Energy Use and Greenhouse Gas Emissions of Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicles

Researchers at Argonne National Laboratory expanded the Greenhouse gases, Regulated Emissions, and Energy use in Transportation (GREET) model and incorporated the fuel economy and electricity use of alternative fuel/vehicle systems simulated by the Powertrain System Analysis Toolkit (PSAT) to conduct a well-to-wheels (WTW) analysis of energy use and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs). The WTW results were separately calculated for the blended charge-depleting (CD) and charge-sustaining (CS) modes of PHEV operation and then combined by using a weighting factor that represented the CD vehicle-miles-traveled (VMT) share. As indicated by PSAT simulations of the CD operation, grid electricity accounted for a share of the vehicle's total energy use, ranging from 6% for a PHEV 10 to 24% for a PHEV 40, based on CD VMT shares of 23% and 63%, respectively. In addition to the PHEV's fuel economy and type of on-board fuel, the marginal electricity generation mix used to charge the vehicle impacted the WTW results, especially GHG emissions. Three North American Electric Reliability Corporation regions (4, 6, and 13) were selected for this analysis, because they encompassed large metropolitan areas (Illinois, New York, and California, respectively) and provided a significant variation of marginal generation mixes. The WTW results were also reported for the U.S. generation mix and renewable electricity to examine cases of average and clean mixes, respectively. For an all-electric range (AER) between 10 mi and 40 mi, PHEVs that employed petroleum fuels (gasoline and diesel), a blend of 85% ethanol and 15% gasoline (E85), and hydrogen were shown to offer a 40-60%, 70-90%, and more than 90% reduction in petroleum energy use and a 30-60%, 40-80%, and 10-100% reduction in GHG emissions, respectively, relative to an internal combustion engine vehicle that used gasoline. The spread of WTW GHG emissions among the different fuel production technologies and grid generation mixes was wider than the spread of petroleum energy use, mainly due to the diverse fuel production technologies and feedstock sources for the fuels considered in this analysis. The PHEVs offered reductions in petroleum energy use as compared with regular hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs). More petroleum energy savings were realized as the AER increased, except when the marginal grid mix was dominated by oil-fired power generation. Similarly, more GHG emissions reductions were realized at higher AERs, except when the marginal grid generation mix was dominated by oil or coal. Electricity from renewable sources realized the largest reductions in petroleum energy use and GHG emissions for all PHEVs as the AER increased. The PHEVs that employ biomass-based fuels (e.g., biomass-E85 and -hydrogen) may not realize GHG emissions benefits over regular HEVs if the marginal generation mix is dominated by fossil sources. Uncertainties are associated with the adopted PHEV fuel consumption and marginal generation mix simulation results, which impact the WTW results and require further research. More disaggregate marginal generation data within control areas (where the actual dispatching occurs) and an improved dispatch modeling are needed to accurately assess the impact of PHEV electrification. The market penetration of the PHEVs, their total electric load, and their role as complements rather than replacements of regular HEVs are also uncertain. The effects of the number of daily charges, the time of charging, and the charging capacity have not been evaluated in this study. A more robust analysis of the VMT share of the CD operation is also needed.

Energy Use Analysis of Open-Curtain vs. Totally Enclosed Broiler Houses in Northwest Arkansas

Seventeen years of electricity and propane fuel use data collected from broiler production houses at the University of Arkansas Applied Broiler Research Farm (ABRF) in Northwest Arkansas were analyzed to quantify the relative effect of open-curtain versus totally enclosed housing systems on energy use. The ABRF consists of four commercial-scale 12- × 121-m (40-× 400-ft) houses and raises broilers under standard production contracts. After the first 15 years of production with open-curtain system, all houses were converted to the solid-wall enclosed system with drop ceiling, tunnel ventilation, and cooling pads in early 2006. The renovations led to reduction of the overall building heat loss factor (W·K-1) from 1389 to 586 for the two steel-frame houses and from 1022 to 428 for the two wooden-truss houses. Mean outside temperature (ranging from 14.7°C to 17.5°C or 58.5°F to 63.5°F in annual mean temperature during the 17-year period) and bird age were found to be the major factors affecting propane fuel usage and ventilation fan electricity usage. Electricity for ventilation and lighting comprised about 87% of the total electricity usage. Annual electricity usage was 27% higher with the enclosed system than with the open-curtain system (102 vs. 80 kWh per 1000-kg market bird weight or 46.4 vs. 36.4 kWh/1000 lb), due to loss of natural daylight and increased mechanical ventilation in the enclosed system. Propane use was comparable between curtain-sided and solid-wall housing schemes, averaging 76- and 65-L/1000 kg market bird weight (9.1 vs. 7.8 gal/1000 lb) before and after renovation, respectively. Higher fuel cost resulted in higher fuel expenditure for winter heating than electricity expenditure for summer cooling in this region. With increasing energy costs, analysis of energy use, as conducted in this study, will assist the decision making of growers to improve energy efficiency or explore alternative energy application.

Analysis of energy use in a sample of Chinese villages

This paper summarises the methodology and results of work involved in the investigation of energy demand in six Chinese villages included in the SUCCESS Project. The procedures used to collect data associated with local energy demand are explained and the approach to data analysis is explained. Results are provided in terms for delivered energy consumption, as an indicator of energy demand; primary energy consumption, as an indicator of energy resource depletion; and carbon dioxide emissions, as an indicator of global climate change. Similarities and differences between results for this sample of villages are considered. The important causes of differences in results are investigated.

Analysis of energy use and carbon losses in the chemical industry

A preliminary bottom-up analysis of the energy use in the chemical industry has been performed, using a model containing datasets on production processes for 52 of the most important bulk chemicals as well as production volumes for these chemicals. The processes analysed are shown to cover between 70% and 100% of the total energy use in the chemical sector. Energy use and the heat effects of the reactions taking place are separately quantified. The processes are also compared with energetically-ideal processes following the stoichometric reactions. The comparison shows that there is significant room for process improvements, both in the direction of more selective processes and in the direction of further energy-savings.

A Modular Process Modeling Tool for the Analysis of Energy Use and Cost in the Pulp and Paper Industry

A novel process modeling tool to facilitate the study of how various process changes in the paper dryer section affect the mill-wide energy system has been developed. A model library with steady-state block models describing paper dryers, heat recovery equipment, and auxiliary systems on component level have been developed using the software Extend. Process models are then created from these block models using graphical programming. In this article, the characteristics of the developed tool are described and a case study where the tool is shown to be useful for analyzing the energy performance of a hybrid dryer section is presented.

Analysis of energy use and efficiency in Turkish manufacturing sector SMEs

Abstract Small and medium size enterprises (SMEs) have an important role in the Turkish economy because of the workforce involved. According to the size of the industrial facilities, there are different cost components related to the total production costs. Energy cost is usually a small portion of the total production cost, but the Turkish industrial sector comprises approximately 35% of Turkey’s total energy consumption and 98.8% of the total number of enterprises in Turkey constitutes the SMEs. Because of the uncertainty of energy costs in the world, it is important to take preventive measures to reduce energy costs and increase efficiencies in industry and consequently in SMEs. In this paper, medium sized enterprises are taken into consideration essentially. Because of getting homogeneity, enterprises with the number of workers between 100 and 200 in the metallic goods industry have been considered in the survey. Energy management includes increasing the profitability by reduced operational costs, and it is also a potential for improving market share. Many different evaluation models have been published in the energy management literature. However, there have not been so many systematic approaches to compare the relative efficiency of the systems. Data envelopment analysis (DEA) is a special linear programming model for deriving the comparative efficiency of multiple-input multiple-output decision making units (DMUs). An evaluation of energy efficiency in 20 medium sized companies has been conducted, and the results are discussed in this paper.

Well-to-Wheels Analysis of Energy Use and Greenhouse Gas Emissions of Hydrogen Produced with Nuclear Energy

A fuel cycle model—called the Greenhouse gases, Regulated Emissions, and Energy use in Transportation (GREET) model—has been developed to evaluate well-to-wheels (WTW) energy and emission impacts of motor vehicle technologies fueled with various transportation fuels. The GREET model contains various hydrogen (H2) production pathways for fuel cell vehicle (FCV) applications. In this study, the GREET model was expanded to include four nuclear H2 production pathways: (a) H2 production at refueling stations via electrolysis using light water reactor–generated electricity, (b) H2 production in central plants via thermochemical water cracking using heat from a high-temperature gas-cooled reactor (HTGR), (c) H2 production in central plants via high-temperature electrolysis using HTGR-generated electricity and steam, and (d) H2 production at refueling stations via electrolysis using HTGR-generated electricity. The WTW analyses of these four options include these stages: uranium ore mining and milling, uranium yellowcake transportation, uranium conversion, uranium enrichment, uranium fuel fabrication, uranium fuel transportation, electricity or H2 production in nuclear power plants, H2 transportation, H2 compression, and H2 FCV operation. Our well-to-pump results show that significant reductions in fossil energy use and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions are achieved by nuclear-based H2 compared to natural gas–based H2 production via steam methane reforming for a unit of H2 delivered at refueling stations. When H2 is applied to FCVs, the WTW results also show large benefits in reducing fossil energy use and GHG emissions.

Comparing High and Low Residential Density: Life-Cycle Analysis of Energy Use and Greenhouse Gas Emissions

This study provides an empirical assessment of energy use and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions associated with high and low residential development. Three major elements of urban development are considered: construction materials for infrastructure (including residential dwellings, utilities, and roads), building operations, and transportation (private automobiles and public transit). Two case studies from the City of Toronto are analyzed. An economic input–output life-cycle assessment (EIO-LCA) model is applied to estimate the energy use and GHG emissions associated with the manufacture of construction materials for infrastructure. Operational requirements for dwellings and transportation are estimated using nationally and/or regionally averaged data. The results indicate that the most targeted measures to reduce GHG emissions in an urban development context should be aimed at transportation emissions, while the most targeted measures to reduce energy usage should focus on building operations. The results also show that low-density suburban development is more energy and GHG intensive (by a factor of 2.0–2.5) than high-density urban core development on a per capita basis. When the functional unit is changed to a per unit of living space basis the factor decreases to 1.0–1.5, illustrating that the choice of functional unit is highly relevant to a full understanding of urban density effects.

06/01011 Economic analysis of energy use in groundwater irrigation of dry areas: a case study in Syria: Gül, A. et al. Applied Energy, 2005, 82, (4), 285–299.

06/01011 Economic analysis of energy use in groundwater irrigation of dry areas: a case study in Syria: Gül, A. et al. Applied Energy, 2005, 82, (4), 285–299.

06/00484 Input-output analysis of energy use in agriculture: Karkacier, O. and Goktolga, G. Energy Conversion and Management, 2005, 46, (9–10), 1513–1521

06/00484 Input-output analysis of energy use in agriculture: Karkacier, O. and Goktolga, G. Energy Conversion and Management, 2005, 46, (9–10), 1513–1521

Index number analysis of Namibian water intensity

There has long been a great deal of interest in methods for analyzing energy use and energy use intensities. Many methods developed within energy studies are also applicable in other areas where materials use is of interest, but in several cases these methods have not been applied to other materials. Index number analysis is a method that is often used in energy economics to analyze changes in the aggregate energy intensity of an economy and to determine whether these changes are due to shifts in the composition of the economy, changes in the energy efficiencies of individual sectors, or both. In order to be useful, index number analysis requires detailed data on the materials usage in individual economic sectors over time. One reason why this method has not been used outside energy studies could be that other materials are rarely regarded as critical enough for this extensive data collection to seem meaningful. However, water is also a crucial resource for many economic sectors, and there are many developing countries where limited water availability is a major issue. In countries that place sufficient priority on water issues to keep track of water use by individual economic sectors, index number analysis provides a methodology which can readily be adapted to analyze changes in water use. This study uses index number analysis to study changes in Namibian aggregate water intensity between 1993 and 2001. The results show that despite considerable increases in water tariffs during this period, sectoral water efficiency has not improved at all. Sectoral water intensities have actually increased, and the only reason why overall water intensity has not increased more than it has is that there has also been a structural shift towards less water intensive economic sectors.

05/01343 An analysis of energy use and input costs for cotton production in Turkey

05/01343 An analysis of energy use and input costs for cotton production in Turkey

Economic analysis of energy use in groundwater irrigation of dry areas: a case study in Syria

This study analyzed the relationship between the fuel-subsidy policy and groundwater-use expansion at macro level and water allocation to different crops at micro level in Syria. Energy uses for major crops were calculated, and a logistic equation fitted to model groundwater, well drilling, and total-irrigated area trends for the period 1986–1999. Energy costs and water use were modeled using input factor cost function to determine the farmers’ response to subsidized energy, using well-monitoring data and formal crop budget survey data, and to analyze water allocation to different crops. Different fuel-cost scenarios were simulated to show the likely effects on crops gross margins and cropping patterns. The study concluded that farmers responded to the agricultural policy of subsidized inputs and supported-prices by expanding cotton, wheat, maize and beat root areas. The research results also showed that the expansion was associated with a high intensity of well drilling and an expansion in groundwater-irrigated areas. This paper analyses the energy costs of groundwater irrigation in five villages in four stability zones in the northeast of Aleppo province in Syria. Although low fuel prices led to expansion in irrigated areas and a rapid increase in cereal production, farmers in all villages tended to over-irrigate and allocated water to high-consuming crops. However, farmers reduced the area allocated to high-consuming crops when water became scarce because costs became prohibitive. The simulation results show that high water-consuming crops do not constitute optimal water allocation decision in water-scarce areas.

Input–output analysis of energy use in agriculture

Abstract The purpose of this study is to analyse the structural interdependency of the agricultural sector and energy sectors in Turkey. The analysis done in this study used the input–output technique. An input–output model is an accounting system showing economic transactions. The relationships between agriculture and energy can be expressed in concept. The data of this study comes from the State Institute of Statistics Prime Ministry, Republic of Turkey, (SIS) databases for the Input–Output Structure of the Turkish Economy.

An analysis of energy use and input costs for cotton production in Turkey

The aim of this study was to determine direct input energy and indirect energy in per hectare in cotton production and compare with input costs. The study also sought to analyse the effect of farm size. Data were collected from sixty five farmers using a face to face questionnaire. The sample farms were selected through a stratified random sampling technique. The results revealed that cotton production consumed a total of 49.73 GJha −1 of which diesel energy consumption was 31.1% followed by fertilizer and machinery energy. Output–input energy ratio and energy productivity were 0.74 and 0.06 kg of cotton MJ −1, respectively. Cost analysis showed that net return per kilogram of seed cotton was insufficient to cover costs of production in the research area. The most important cost items were labour, machinery costs, land rent and pesticide costs. Large farms were more successful in energy productivity, use efficiency and economic performance. It was concluded that energy management at farm level could be improved to give more efficient and economic use of energy.

Capital vintage and climate change policies: the case of US pulp and paper

Abstract The climate change policy debate and ensuing discussions about industrial energy use and carbon emissions have highlighted the need to: (a) aggregate engineering information to a level relevant for economic policy analysis while maintaining sufficient detail so that results are meaningful for industry decision makers, (b) properly represent an industry’s capital vintage structure to better understand inertia associated with changes in aggregate industrial emissions profiles, and (c) identify policy instruments that leverage an industry’s potential for technological change such that carbon emissions can be noticeably reduced. This paper presents an econometric analysis of energy use and emissions profiles of the US Pulp and Paper Industry and uses the resulting set of equations to specify a dynamic model for the analysis of select climate change policies. Scenarios of cost of carbon, energy tax, and investment-led policies indicate that a combination of cost of carbon and investment-led policies can achieve the desired result of rapidly improving overall efficiency of the industry and promoting changes in fuel mix, which together can result in drastic reductions of carbon emissions.

Energy-use analysis and improvement for delayed coking units

This paper presents the energy and exergy analyses for a delayed coking unit in a Chinese refinery using the three-link energy structural model. According to the results of energy-use analysis and evaluation, the potentials of energy-use and improvements for energy-savings as well as detail procedures are suggested. The proposed improvements are expected to remarkably lower the energy consumption and to improve the economic profits of the delayed coking unit. Compared to the original unit, the energy consumption of the improved flowsheet decreased by 37.2%, which demonstrates that the applied strategies are suitable for the energy-use analysis and improvement of process systems.