Finite Energy Resources Research Articles

Energy saving and environmental resources potentials: Toward new methods of building design

With the current issues concerning the management of finite energy resources and the potential savings in the building sector, reducing building energy consumption is a key point. Up to now, efforts have been focused on insulation to separate the inner ambiance from the fluctuation of the outside air temperature. Assuming that insulating a building might not be the best solution to exploit the free renewable sources of its environment (outside air temperature, sky temperature, solar radiation), a first identification step has been carried out to determine which sources should be exploited. Building energy simulations have been carried out, including several insulation levels and climatic conditions. Then, indicators have been defined in order to quantify the ability of the previous sources to cover the energy needs and the possibility for the building to exploit them. Finally, the previous indicators have been applied to the different configurations of buildings. The study shows that whatever the climate or the insulation level is, some resources such as the sun and the sky are not enough exploited, although some could entirely cover the building needs at each time step (case of the sky). When it is not possible, the paper proposes a method to evaluate the remaining needs and the sizing of a supplementary heating/cooling system.

Social context modulates sickness behavior

Sickness behaviors constitute an array of symptoms exhibited by an animal during the course of an infection, including reduced activity, reduced food and water intake, and reduced social interactions. It is hypothesized that these symptoms enable reallocation of finite energy resources to fight infection. In this way, by focusing energy on healing, available resources are being removed from other activities, potentially reducing adaptive opportunities, such as mating. Hence, to achieve increased reproductive success, animals might be able to adjust the expression of sickness behaviors to their environmental circumstances. While abiotic conditions such as temperature and season can modulate sickness behaviors, no studies in passerines have linked modulation of sickness behaviors to social settings. Here, it is demonstrated that social surroundings affect the extent to which animals exhibit symptoms of sickness. After an immune challenge, zebra finches kept in isolation markedly reduced activity, but those kept in a colony setting did not. The same trend is verified when looking at the time they spent resting. Additionally, a proinflammatory cytokine (interleukin-6) was quantified in plasma samples and all animals that had been immune challenged showed increased levels of this marker, showing that the physiological response was similar. Hence, birds in a social context were able to overcome the behavioral, but not physiological, symptoms usually associated with an inflammatory response. These findings suggest a trade-off between allowing the body to respond to an infection and taking advantage of being in a social situation.

Electricity Consumption and Possible Savings

Energy has always been critical for economic growth and social development. The need and use of energy is one of the major problems for all countries. The reserves in the ground are very limited while their use grows significantly every year. Given finite energy resources and continuously rising demand for industrial products, meeting industrial energy demand and minimizing its economic impact in the future will be a significant challenge. Because of the hard fact of energy scarcity, it is important to take preventive measures to reduce energy costs, and increase efficiencies in industry. The key factors of a sustainable energy politics are promoting growing energy efficiency, ensuring the diversity of energy technology and adding renewable sources to the energy supply system. Energy efficiency implementation in the production may lead enterprises to be a part of sustainable development and also save millions of dollars. Energy efficiency problems have many aspects. One of the most important of the problems is lost and leaking electricity, which has an immense negative effect on energy efficiency. In the present study we mainly focus on electricity consumption and possible savings. We begin by an overview of the World’s energy production and consumption as well as Turkey’s energy production and consumption. In the next part, we contextualize this by discussing the relationship between the energy and the environment. We secondly realize a SWOT analysis to show the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of Turkey’s energy politics from an environmental point of view. We contextualize this by discussing a global overview of electricity sector in the world and in Turkey. The more discussion focuses on Turkish Industrial energy consumption and the amount of possible annual savings in the Turkish industrial sector.

3.1.1 A Look at the U.S. Energy System –A Strategic Impact Model (2050 SIM)

AbstractAlthough the United States (U.S.) energy infrastructure is reliable and accessible, it is also excessively reliant on foreign energy sources, experiences high volatility in energy prices, does not always practice good stewardship of finite indigenous energy resources, and emits significant quantities of greenhouse gases. The U.S. Department of Energy is conducting research and development on advanced nuclear reactor concepts and technologies, including High Temperature Gas Reactor (HTGR) technologies, directed at helping the United States meet its current and future energy challenges.This paper discusses the systematic approach used to develop the 2050 Strategic Impact Model (2050 SIM), which allows the user to analyze and depict the benefits of various energy sources in meeting the energy demand. It also provides an overall systems understanding of the tradeoffs between building and using HTGRs versus other existing technologies for providing energy (heat and electricity) to various energy‐use sectors in the United States. This paper also provides the assumptions used in the model, the rational for the methodology, and the references for the source documentation and source data used in developing 2050 SIM.

Evaluating the benefits of an electrical energy storage system in a future smart grid

Interest in electrical energy storage systems is increasing as the opportunities for their application become more compelling in an industry with a back-drop of ageing assets, increasing distributed generation and a desire to transform networks into Smart Grids. A field trial of an energy storage system designed and built by ABB is taking place on a section of 11 kV distribution network operated by EDF Energy Networks in Great Britain. This paper reports on the findings from simulation software developed at Durham University that evaluates the benefits brought by operating an energy storage system in response to multiple events on multiple networks. The tool manages the allocation of a finite energy resource to achieve the most beneficial shared operation across two adjacent areas of distribution network. Simulations account for the key energy storage system parameters of capacity and power rating. Results for events requiring voltage control and power flow management show how the choice of operating strategy influences the benefits achieved. The wider implications of these results are discussed to provide an assessment of the role of electrical energy storage systems in future Smart Grids.

Life cycle assessment of geothermal binary power plants using enhanced low-temperature reservoirs

Geothermal binary power plants that use low-temperature heat sources have gained increasing interest in the recent years due to political efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and the consumption of finite energy resources. The construction of such plants requires large amounts of energy and material. Hence, the question arises if geothermal binary power plants are also environmentally promising from a cradle-to-grave point of view. In this context, a comprehensive Life Cycle Analysis (LCA) on geothermal power production from EGS (enhanced geothermal systems) low-temperature reservoirs is performed. The results of the analysis show that the environmental impacts are very much influenced by the geological conditions that can be obtained at a specific site. At sites with (above-) average geological conditions, geothermal binary power generation can significantly contribute to more sustainable power supply. At sites with less favorable conditions, only certain plant designs can make up for the energy and material input to lock up the geothermal reservoir by the provided energy. The main aspects of environmentally sound plants are enhancement of the reservoir productivity, reliable design of the deep wells and an efficient utilization of the geothermal fluid for net power and district heat production.

The Global Network on Dental Education: a new vision for IFDEA

The advent of globalization has changed our perspectives radically. It presents increased understanding of world affairs, new challenges and exciting opportunities. The inequitable distribution and use of finite energy resources and global warming are just two examples of challenges that can only be addressed by concerted international collaboration. Globalization has become an increasingly important influence on dentistry and dental education. The International Federation for Dental Educators and Associations (IFDEA) welcomes the challenges it now faces as a player in a complex multifaceted global community. This report addresses the new circumstances in which IFDEA must operate, taking account of the recommendations made by other working groups. The report reviews the background and evolution of IFDEA and describes the extensive developments that have taken place in IFDEA over the past year with the introductions of a new Constitution and Bylaws overseen by a newly established Board of Directors. These were the consequence of a new mission, goals and objectives for IFDEA. An expanded organization is planned using http://www.IFDEA.org as the primary instrument to facilitate the exchange of knowledge, programmes and expertise between colleagues and federated associations throughout the world, thereby promoting higher standards in oral health through education in low-, middle- and high-income countries of the world. Such aspirations are modified by the reality and enormity of poverty-related global ill health.

"Clean" Nuclear Energy?: Global Warming, Public Health, and Justice

In May of this year, the governor of Maryland, the state where I live, announced his support for a new nuclear power plant to join the two existing plants on the Chesapeake Bay. is a huge moral challenge and it is a moral imperative, Governor O'Malley said, given what massive new burning of coal will do to the planet if we don't develop better and cleaner technology, including safer and cleaner nuclear, which is what is ... planned and talked about in terms of the third reactor. (1) Governor O'Malley is right that current energy policy presents a huge moral challenge: the combustion of fossil fuels is measurably harming the world's climate, threatening species and low-lying island nations, and facilitating the spread of diseases such as malaria into ecosystems formerly inhospitable to the carrier mosquito. There are vast disparities in the use of the world's finite energy resources. Those of us in the world's richest countries consume sixty times more per capita of the world's nonrenewable energy resources --oil, coal, natural gas, uranium--than do people in the poorest countries. (2) Oil production at the expense of human rights in countries such as Nigeria contributes to regional and global insecurity. Coal mining in Appalachia and in other regions of the world has devastated the landscape, polluted watersheds, and literally undermined communities whose homes and infrastructures collapse into sinkholes caused by mine subsidence. The increase in renewable energy production, particularly the shift of corn from a food crop to the raw material for a fifteen billion gallon fuel mandate in the 2007 U.S. federal energy bill, has contributed to a new global food crisis and to conversion of more and more arable land to monocrops, leading to the exhaustion of soil fertility and increasing reliance on expensive and hazardous synthetic fertilizers, pesticides, and herbicides. Although high energy costs are changing behaviors across almost all socioeconomic groups these days, the biggest losers are those without the economic and political power to insulate themselves from the negative consequences of the world's energy production and consumption--not just in higher energy and food costs, but in ecosystem damage and the adverse health effects of water, air, and soil pollution. While the immediate and most acute consequences are felt by the poor, there are long-term implications for future generations of human and nonhuman species, and the earth systems on which all life depends--a moral challenge if there ever was one. I agree with Governor O'Malley that there is a moral imperative for something better and cleaner. The question is whether nuclear power is that alternative. Policy deliberation about the proposed renaissance of nuclear power must take into consideration the disproportionate health risks associated with uranium extraction, processing, enrichment, waste storage, and nuclear accidents, not to mention repurposing for weapons. The history of nuclear power is intimately tied to the history of nuclear arms. It is no coincidence that in the game of cat and mouse that is international nuclear inspection, whether uranium is being used for power generation or military purposes is always a question. In the United States, research on the development of the atomic bomb led, in the post--World War II years, to the establishment of the Atomic Energy Commission, the predecessor of today's Department of Energy. In 1954, the Atomic Energy Act Amendments created a licensing system for private nuclear power operators, and in 1957, Congress passed the Price-Anderson Act, which indemnifies private operators in the event of a nuclear accident. This act, currently extended until 2025, limits a nuclear utility's liability to $10 billion, with the remainder of the liability borne by U.S. taxpayers. Critics, liberal and conservative alike, have criticized the act as an inappropriate government subsidy that externalizes (and thus leads to underrepresentation of) the real cost of nuclear power. …

Energy efficiency modeling for IEEE 802.11 DCF system without retry limits

The proliferation of mobile computing devices including portable computers, PDAs and handheld devices has created a tremendous demand for wireless local area networks (WLANs). One of the greatest limitations of contemporary WLANs is the finite energy resource of mobile computing devices. As a result, energy-efficient protocol design for WLANs has recently become the focus of many research efforts. To design energy-efficient protocols, it is indispensable to thoroughly investigate the energy consumption of WLANs. In this paper, we propose an analytical framework to study the energy consumption and energy efficiency of IEEE 802.11 WLANs. Extensive simulations are conducted to validate the theoretical analysis. It is shown that the theoretical model is accurate in predicting the energy efficiency over a wide range of scenarios. In addition, the impacts of different MAC layer parameters on energy efficiency of IEEE 802.11 WLANs are examined. Insights into the effects of different parameters on energy efficiency are provided as well.

Dynamic life cycle assessment (LCA) of renewable energy technologies

Before new technologies enter the market, their environmental superiority over competing options must be asserted based on a life cycle approach. However, when applying the prevailing status-quo Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) approach to future renewable energy systems, one does not distinguish between impacts which are ‘imported’ into the system due to the ‘background system’ (e.g. due to supply of materials or final energy for the production of the energy system), and what is the improvement potential of these technologies compared to competitors (e.g. due to process and system innovations or diffusion effects). This paper investigates a dynamic approach towards the LCA of renewable energy technologies and proves that for all renewable energy chains, the inputs of finite energy resources and emissions of greenhouse gases are extremely low compared with the conventional system. With regard to the other environmental impacts the findings do not reveal any clear verdict for or against renewable energies. Future development will enable a further reduction of environmental impacts of renewable energy systems. Different factors are responsible for this development, such as progress with respect to technical parameters of energy converters, in particular, improved efficiency; emissions characteristics; increased lifetime, etc.; advances with regard to the production process of energy converters and fuels; and advances with regard to ‘external’ services originating from conventional energy and transport systems, for instance, improved electricity or process heat supply for system production and ecologically optimized transport systems for fuel transportation. The application of renewable energy sources might modify not only the background system, but also further downstream aspects, such as consumer behavior. This effect is, however, strongly context and technology dependent.

Vegetable oils for biofuels versus surfactants: an ecological comparison for energy and greenhouse gases

This paper compares the use of vegetable oils as energy carriers on the one hand and for the production of chemicals on the other hand. The bio-based energy carriers analyzed are rapeseed oil, rapeseed oil methyl ester, and palm oil methyl ester, all of which can be used as substitutes for diesel fuel. The chemicals studied are surfactants. Surfactants can be produced from plant-based feedstocks (oleochemical surfactants) and from petrochemicals. The various options are studied with regard to two ecological indicators, i.e. the consumption of finite energy resources and the global warming potential. First of all, for these two aspects plant-based sources show clear advantages when compared with their fossil counterparts. Secondly, the transesterified types of biofuels are more advantageous than pure vegetable oils. Thirdly, the conservation of finite energy and reduction in emissions of greenhouse gases are higher if vegetable oils are used as a feedstock to produce oleochemical surfactants compared to their use as biofuels. Comprehensive life-cycle analyses must be carried out in order to determine whether these results can also be applied to other ecological indicators. The results presented in this paper support developing strategic goals for bio-based feedstocks, including quantity and cost targets.

The MANTO Project : Telematics - opportunities and risks for traffic and settlement

The MANTO research project carried out in the years 1984-1987 at the Swiss Federal Institutes of Technology (ETH) at Zürich and Lausanne examines possible trends in telematics, mainly looking at their impact on transport and settlement but also studying their effects on society, economy and environment. The rapid spread of new telematics applications is associated with opportunities as well as risks. Telematics can be used, on the one hand, to effect large-scale decentralisation and small-scale mingling of functions in towns and villages and, on the other hand, to more rationally manage or substite traffic. Both help conserve our finite land and energy resources and bring about a reduction of pollution urgently needed. At the same time, use of telematics should be made to improve the employment situation and to create educational opportunities throughout the country and the economy. Finally, telematics applications which reverse tendencies of social isolation should be developed and promoted. Such opportunities and development do not just happen. On the contrary, there is a great need for action. But there is also still scope for action. If the opportunities are to be seized and the risks avoided, we cannot just wait to learn from other people's experience. For economics' and society's sake, active participation in developing this technology is required. Deliberate action is called for.

The value of natural environments in the extraction of finite energy resources: A method of valuation

The value of the natural environment is invariably excluded from the costing of finite energy resources due to difficulties associated with noncommensurability. This paper illustrates a method of valuation for strip mining coal in a virgin natural environment. The method is based on the principles of irreversibility and opportunity costs. Although the values derived represent a bottom threshold, their inclusion would prompt an improvement in the allocation of scarce resources for the development of energy technologies.

Trade-offs for conflicting social objectives in the extraction of finite energy resources

Three social objectives figure prominently in the extraction of finite energy resources, namely income maximization, environmental quality, and inter-generational concern. Owing to lack of complementarity, the pursuit of these objectives often results in conflicts. As a result, extraction strategies should be based on the determination of trade-offs between the objectives. The paper deals with the formulation and illustration of a systems model to determine these trade-offs. The recognition of such trade-offs results in a greater conservation of the finite energy resource, and hence could act as an incentive for the development of alternative energy sources.

IEE Electronics Division: Chairman's address. Communications in the 21st Century

A restrained extrapolation is made on the basis of the further development of some of today's technology seen against a background of the finite radio spectrum and limited energy resources. Present-day communications have become established as a set of complementary services, radio, television, telephone, letters, newspapers, records, films etc, with separate terminal devices and each having their own distribution channels. It is assumed that in the 21st century the techniques, such as antenna array signal processing, will lead to much more effective use of the radio spectrum and that optical fibres will provide a wideband switched network to the local area. In these circumstances it will be economically and operationally attractive to integrate communications systems providing a wide variety of functions. It is postulated that most ‘deliveries’ connected with information and entertainment will be electronic, leaving physical transportation for essentials like food and fuel or luxuries like ‘limited editions’ and paintings where there is pleasure derived from direct association with the originator of the art work. The question of man adapting to the machine or the machine adapting to man is discussed. It is concluded that further developments in speech recognition are more likely than man learning to speak or read in a binary language suitable for direct communication with computers. It is noted that there has been little change in the basic transducers of electronic communications (i.e. the microphone, loudspeaker, television-camera tube and c.r.t. display) since their first introduction. Although electronic aural communications are close to saturating the capability of the human receptor, electronic visual communication has a long way to go before it saturates the capability of the eye-brain combination.

Hydrogen in the seaward advancement of industrial societies

Since the initial impetus of Derek Gregory's landmark analysis of the Hydrogen Economy in 1972, most concepts for producing hydrogen offshore have assumed that the entire product utilization will be onshore. Although delivery to shore is undoubtedly one option, there is another, which is use at sea at or near the site of hydrogen generation. While many of us strive toward the development of hydrogen as tomorrow's fuel, another evolutionary bud is sprouting: our industry is beginning to move seaward. At the same time most signs point to a realization that we are on the threshold of a new social order; a society that is growth-limited by finite energy resources and one that may have to modify its techno-demographic patterns. Existing onshore energy infrastructures must convert to hydrogen at considerable expense and the conversion must be incremental and non-disruptive—no mean challenge. Offshore urban/industrial complexes, on the other hand, could be based upon hydrogen from the beginning. They could thus serve as test and demonstration beds for the eventual adoption of hydrogen as the storable, transportable and ecologically sound fuel base of highly efficient urban/industrial complexes everywhere. This paper explores this option and offers glimpses of future possibilities.