Renewable Energy : Renewable Resources

Everyone uses a lot of power for lighting, heating, machines, movements, and so much more. All of that energy has to come from an energy supply. Some energy resources are renewable, while others are non-renewable. Energy has various forms and is a very essential part of our everyday lives.

Firstly, and put very simply, fossil fuels are non-renewable! Once the finite deposits of brown and black coal are exhausted around the planet there will be no more energy generated by this process. Current estimates predict that all known coal deposits will be exhausted within the next 120 years.

What exactly is renewable energy? In the terms of The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC, 2015), renewable energy comes from sources that can be replenished easily. Solar power, wind energy, hydroelectricity, geothermal, and biomass energy are all examples of this. All of these sources can be replenished, or renewed naturally. Wind energy is free of pollution and costs about the same as electricity from coal. Solar energy is growing cheaper, and is used in many every day appliances. Biomass energy uses materials such as wood, corn, soy, and sometimes animal waste. It takes time for biomass energy to grow, but it is a critical renewable resource. Hydroelectricity is energy produced by flowing water and accounts for six percent of America’s electric supply (NRDC, 2015). If we can make the transition to a future of cleaner energy sources, we can eliminate our dependence on fossil

The world's fossil fuels are running out. With the average amount of time it takes for coal to form being 300 billion years, the earth can only renew them so fast. Fossil fuels, like coal and oil take the earth billions of years to reproduce so an effective alternate energy source must be explored. Fossil fuels or crude oil has been around for a long time and can be refined to form a number of products such as gas, gasoline, kerosene, gas oil or diesel. We are also running out of oil which is also a non-renewable resource. According to ecotricity.co.uk, if we continue to consume fossil fuels like this, they will run out by approximately 2088. The use of fossil fuels is also dangerous to the environment. Burning coal and oil produces smog

It is true that all good things must come to an end, but fossil fuels were never a good thing to begin with. Fossil fuels are nonrenewable resources, such as coal and oil, that are used to power the modern mechanical world people live in today. The price of these resources is more than just money, for these resources generally have a less positive and overall more negative outcome. Society has become increasingly dependent on these resources that are destroying the world in more ways than one, and despite this obvious fact they are still being used. Society is just starting to stumble with energy efficiency, and an inability to adapt ensures that it will not take long until a complete loss of control over the environment and resources is

Solar and wind power have become great alternative sources of energy that in scientific terms can be considered renewable sources. A renewable energy source is an energy source that naturally replaces itself at a rate of at least the natural timeline.

[Fossil fuels are expected to continue supplying much of the energy used worldwide. Although liquid fuels—mostly petroleum-based—remain the largest source of energy, the liquids share of world marketed energy consumption falls from 34 percent in 2010 to 28 percent in 2040, as projected high world oil prices lead many energy users to switch away from liquid fuels when feasible. http://www.eia.gov/forecasts/ieo/more_highlights.cfm]

We use fossil fuels because they are readily available and easy to use, although they will not be readily available forever. Coal, oil and natural gas are all non-renewable resources, which means there is a finite supply of these energy sources. In 2014, BP stated that we only have 53.3 years of oil left to use at the rate that it is currently being used (“The World Has 53.3 Years of Oil Left” 1). This doesn’t mean that we will run out of oil in 53 years, as new sources are still being discovered. Nonetheless, there are plenty of alternative energy sources such as water, solar, wind, and nuclear power that could be taken advantage of and used alongside of fossil fuels in order to lengthen the amount of time that fossil fuels could be put

Starting small I wanted to explain what fossil fuels are exactly. Also how they are non- renewable, meaning that they indeed will run out one day, and there is no way how to replenish the supply after it is gone. Fossil fuels are natural fuels such as coal or gas, these fuels formed in the geological past from the remains of microscopic plants and ancient animals like dinosaurs that lived and died millions of years ago. The plants and animals or (diatoms) absorbed energy that came from the biggest star in our universe, this star is the sun. Energy from the sun transferred over and was stored into carbon molecules in the bodies of the plants and animals. As millions of years passed by, the dead bodies of the plants and animals were covered by thick layers of bacteria. The bacterial layers formed new plants from the remains of microscopic plants and animals to make organic materials. The deeper they were inside the earth the more pressure and heat began to rise and depending on the amount of pressure and heat formed these different fossil fuels. The fossil fuels that were formed unfortunately were only a finite amount. Because there is only a finite amount there will not be any more of these fuels after all are used. It is controversial to society because we run our everyday life with a dependence on fossil fuels.

Fossil Fuels as a source of energy is limited and it contributes to so many disastrous situations including climate change and pollution. They release pollutants into the atmosphere that causes environmental problems around the world. One example of an environmental problem is using coal and there is a huge amount of it to use so therefore the world will continue to utilize coal. Every day of the year, we produce carbon dioxide that is released into the earth’s atmosphere which will stay for over a hundred years. Alternative energy that does not emit carbon dioxide into the air needs to replace the current technologies for better performance and overall better reliability. Fossil fuels are very limited, therefore making them harder to find eventually. In the Alternative Energy article it states, “Back in the 1960s, predictions that the United States would have pumped over half of its total supply of oil by the 1970 's met with stiff opposition from the energy dealers and by governments buoyed up by fuel profits. They were wrong, the U.S. is now well past its halfway point in consuming its inexpensive oil reserves.” (Alternative Energy) This quote shows that the U.S. has used up over half of their oil reserves than they have expected. This is evidence to the fact that fossil fuels are limited and the major problem is that they are

Since the advent of the internal combustion engine nearly two centuries ago, humans have become increasingly reliant on fuel to power these engines. Our only method, historically, for obtaining this fuel is to probe the earth and oceans until crude oil is struck. Crude oil is termed a fossil fuel as it takes hundreds of millions of years to form. Crude oil is extracted from a geological reservoir and subsequently refined into the various fuels which we use at ever increasing rates (petroleum, diesel, aviation fuel etc). Unfortunately we are not finding new oil deposits at anything like the rates we are consuming, so logically we will eventually run out. Many of the alternate energy sources currently available (electric engines, fuel cells and ethanol) have low energy density and do not scale well to larger vehicles like aeroplanes and trucks. Therefore finding new renewable sources of energy to power our current and future devices is paramount to our continuation as a successful species.

Renewable resources are the abundant resources that the Earth supplies and do not have a limit. These resources include the sun, wind, water, and the internal heat of the earth. Solar energy collects and uses the rays of the sun to generate energy, and is completely renewable until the sun burns away. Energy can be generated by the sun through the use of solar panels. Solar panels can be any size, and can be connected to garden lamps, houses, lights, or in a big solar farm for an entire city. Wind energy uses the force of the wind to spin a turbine which then generates electricity. The turbines are constructed on large plains, over the water, or in rural towns where the wind is most powerful (Ailworth). Water is another source of power that is used in many different ways to produce energy. Hydropower is the energy produced from fast flowing or falling water, such as strong rivers. Hydroelectricity is energy

Renewable resources are also known as alternative energy sources. Alternative Energy is any source of energy that can be renewed (Issit). Renewable Energies include hydrogen fuel, biomass fuel, hydropower, solar power, geothermic energy, and nuclear power. Hydrogen fuel is an amalgamation of hydrogen and oxygen which is used to produce electricity (Issit). Biomass fuel is made from materials which have already been used, such as compost, and can be used to generate electricity (Issit). Hydropower can be created through moving water or wind to generate electricity (Issit). Using sunlight to produce electricity is called solar power (Issit). Geothermic energy is energy made by the heat under the earth’s mantle (Issit). Nuclear power is

Ever since the late 19th century, people have been trying to perfect energy sources to make their lives easier. An ideal Energy source is one that costs little to produce, little to maintain, and yields a high energy output. We found a temporary resource that we used for over a century, coal and natural gases. The problem with sources like these are that they will eventually run out. Renewable energy is energy that can be produced without depletion. Human have been using a form of renewable energy for hundreds of years, such as the watermill. Renewable energy is needed because it will never run out, it is more efficient than today’s methods, and it does not pollute the environment with greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide.

Renewable energy is such a form of energy as is replaced rapidly by a natural process such as power generated from the sun or from the wind etc.