Although technology change (usually involving an improvement in energy efficiency) is not inherently a geographic process, it does not occur uniformly over geographic space. Consequently, mathematical modeling and behavioral and innovation diffusion studies by geographers have improved our understanding of the pervasive phenomenon of technology energy efficiency change in energy markets. Similarly, creative government policies in Germany since 1990 have led to a faster rate of adoption of renewable energy sources, compared to the United States. (more…)
The development of the ‘‘new’’ wind and solar technologies is of great importance for the future contribution of RESs to energy sup ...
Renewable energy sources cannot run out and causes so little damage to the environment that its use does not need to be restric ...
In Europe, modern renewable energy sources technologies were explored thoroughly for the first time after the oil embargo/ price cr ...
Government expenditures on energy R&D, energy conservation have risen steadily over the past decade, but only two countries, Japan ...
"Spain has great potential but lack geothermal legislation and investment." Besides being clean, renewable and friendly, easily man ...
Earth’s climate is a complex system of interacting natural components. These components include the atmosphere, the ocean, and the continental ice sheets. Living things on earth—or, the biosphere—also constitute an important component of the climate trends system.
Numerous factors influence Earth’s climate system, some of them natural. For example, the slow drift of continents that takes place over millions of years, a process known as plate tectonics, influences the composition of the atmosphere through its impact on volcanic activity and surface erosion. (more…)
Scientists study Earth’s climate not just from observation but also from a theoretical perspective. Modern-day climate models succe ...
Since preindustrial times, ambient concentrations of the greenhouse gases have exhibited substantial increases, inter alia CO2 ...
Still hotly debated by some, human-induced global warming is now accepted in the scientific community. Earth’s average yearly tempe ...
Options for dealing with the threats of climate change include both adaptation to inevitable changes and mitigation, or lessening, ...
Since the early 1960s, climate change and air quality have become major and often controversial issues in many countries and am ...
Options for dealing with the threats of climate change include both adaptation to inevitable changes and mitigation, or lessening, of those changes that we can still affect. One possible adaptation would be to adjust our agricultural practices to the changing regional patterns of temperature and rainfall. Another would be to build coastal defenses against the inundation from sea-level rise. Only mitigation, however, can prevent the most threatening changes. (more…)
Earth’s climate is a complex system of interacting natural components. These components include the atmosphere, the ocean, and the ...
Scientists study Earth’s climate not just from observation but also from a theoretical perspective. Modern-day climate models succe ...
Although some scientists and critics still dispute that human caused greenhouse gases are causing climate change, the majority of s ...
Still hotly debated by some, human-induced global warming is now accepted in the scientific community. Earth’s average yearly tempe ...
Addressing global warming, however, is a highly complex and daunting endeavor. Many climate experts have urged the world to stabili ...
There are various and somewhat complementary reasons to foster the growth of renewable energy sources in Europe. A major incentive for renewable energy sources policies in the past two decades has been to reduce the environmental impact of energy use both locally (e.g., pollutant emission reduction) and globally (e.g., greenhouse gas and carbon emissions reduction). In some countries, concerns about the safety of nuclear power generation have motivated the search for renewable energy sources. Another motivation for replacing foreign fossil and nuclear fuels with domestic renewable energy sources relates to security issues and Europe’s growing dependency on foreign energy sources. (more…)
In Europe, modern renewable energy sources technologies were explored thoroughly for the first time after the oil embargo/ price cr ...
Renewable energy sources cannot run out and causes so little damage to the environment that its use does not need to be restric ...
The development of the ‘‘new’’ wind and solar technologies is of great importance for the future contribution of RESs to energy sup ...
World energy use has increased steadily over the past several decades. Much of the growth in world energy consumption has been ...
Over the last decade, the number of countries researching the potential of biomass and bioenergy for energy services rose rapid ...
The spark-ignition and compression-ignition engine and internal combustion engines technologies that are currently employed in motor vehicles were developed more than 100 years ago. These conventional vehicle technologies are fueled by petroleum-derived gasoline and diesel fuels (the socalled conventional fuels). Over the past 100 years, the conventional technologies have been dramatically improved, reducing cost and increasing performance. (more…)
ISO document 14040 identifies four areas for using life cycle analysis (LCA) results: (1) identifying opportunities to improve ...
The fuel cycle for a given transportation fuel includes the following processes: energy feedstock (or primary energy) product ...
There are different types of vehicle propulsion systems and the transportation fuels that have been studied for their potential ...
Because different studies have different system boundaries and parametric assumptions, the studies described in Section 7 resulted ...
For processes that produce multiple products, energy and emission burdens have to be allocated to individual products. ISO 14040 ad ...
The age of industrialization came into full force through the modern exploration and use of fossil fuels. As one of its most striking phenomena, the rapid expansion of cities throughout the late 19th and the 20th centuries was a direct outcome of the fossil fuel energy economy as well. (more…)
The aim is to work with cities in advancing renewable energy technologies and systems and to help promote the renewable energy indu ...
The Solar City approach originally emerged from a new generation of International Energy Agency (IEA) energy research and developme ...
In the absence of useful and established patterns of practice, a search is under way for new means of reconciling local government’ ...
As a reaction to these historical perspectives, the building industry has witnessed a certain rise in design responses to regio ...
Climate change caused by the enhanced greenhouse effect is one of the most significant global environmental issues. Increased emiss ...
The leading automotive brands are being focused to produce electric vehicles because they believe they represent a harmony to the environment and climate change solution. (more…)
Most production systems try to become first full-scale production begins as small toys and devices of concept. The Horizon hydr ...
Fuel cell vehicles are being developed because they promise to meet the requirements expected of automobiles in a market increa ...
We know of no studies that have examined vehicle taxation incentives programs elsewhere in the world, but it seems likely that ...
The spark-ignition and compression-ignition engine and internal combustion engines technologies that are currently employed in ...
Mercedes-Benz presented at Geneva Style F800 Concept (the F stands for Mercedes: technology, design and art), a prototype that ...
Do we have the resources? Rudolf Diesel developed the diesel engine which ran on biodiesel vegetable oil in the late 1800s. At the time, he speculated that his discovery seemed insignificant, but later could prove to be as important as mankind’s uncovering of future energy uses for petroleum and coal tar. Given the U.S.’ rapid expansion into biofuels, it would appear his vision was correct due to the drawbacks of biofuels. But widespread adoption of biomass-based fuels is not a foregone conclusion. Two questions haunt its progress. First, will it truly reduce U.S. reliance on fossil fuels? And second, is there enough farmland to accommodate widespread production, without jeopardizing food supplies? (more…)
Biofuels are made from living matter, plant or animal, and are strongly favored by agricultural interests because of the large ...
We had expressed our disagreement with Biofuels and tell them also that the European Union also wants to distance themselves from t ...
At present, in the United States and worldwide, motor vehicles are fueled almost exclusively by petroleum based gasoline (or re ...
One of the main benefits from future use of biofuels would be the reduction of greenhouse gases compared to the use of fossil f ...
Transportation is another sector that has increased its relative share of primary energy use. This sector has serious concerns ...
Although the focus of many policy studies of climate change is on establishing the causal links between anthropogenic systems, emissions of greenhouse gases climate change, the line of causation also runs the other way. Short-term fluctuations in climate conditions, particularly in the temperate zones on the planet, affect energy consumption. If the popular expectation that the climate will become warmer becomes a reality, we can expect winters and summers that are warmer than those of the past. (more…)
Establishing the impact of climate change on energy demand requires a measure of heating and cooling requirements. In the United St ...
Here, the sensitivity of energy demand to climate is measured two ways. The first method uses elasticities that provide simple summ ...
To determine the effects of past climate trends on global energy consumption, the econometric equations providing the degree day el ...
Energy is consumed by various segments of the economy, including households, commercial establishments, manufacturing enterpris ...
Scientists study Earth’s climate not just from observation but also from a theoretical perspective. Modern-day climate models succe ...
Bioenergy produced from biomass is sometimes called a carbon-neutral energy source, because the same quantity of carbon released when the biomass is burned is sequestered again when the crop or forest is re-grown. Referring to bioenergy as carbon neutral or having zero net emissions may be misleading; there are emissions associated with producing biomass, such as from fossil fuel used in cultivation, harvest, processing and transport, and in manufacture and construction of fuel conversion technology. (more…)
Climate change caused by the enhanced greenhouse effect is one of the most significant global environmental issues. Increased emiss ...
The quantification of the actual reduction in green house gases sourcess emissions resulting from the substitution of fossil fu ...
To date, most discussion and research relating to the various of biomass role in mitigating CO2 emissions has been focused around i ...
The future development of energy crops, to the level at which they would replace residues as the major bioenergy fuel source, will ...
Estimation of the future technical potential of biomass as an energy source is dependent on assumptions with respect to land av ...