Global Exergy and the Asian Economies

At this year's Foo Camp, I went to an interesting discussion on Global Energy led by Saul Griffith and Jim McBride. Using the work of Wes Hermann, they presented a first draft of a pretty compelling slide show, which one member of the audience suggested they call "A Convenient Truth". Wes Hermann has done extensive research on Exergy and how much of it is physically available. Saul and Jim want to make his work more accessible in the hope that it might shape energy policy.

What is Exergy? We refer to the following definition from a paper of Wes Hermann:

Exergy is used as a common currency to assess and compare the reservoirs of theoretically extractable work we call energy resources. Resources consist of matter or energy with properties different from the predominant conditions in the environment. These differences can be classified as physical, chemical, or nuclear exergy. This paper identifies the primary exergy reservoirs that supply exergy to the biosphere and quantifies the intensive and extensive exergy of their derivative secondary reservoirs, or resources.

Wes Hermann not only calculates the available Exergy from most energy sources, he also determines where particular energy resources are most plentiful. ("How much solar energy can one generate if one blanketed the earth's ENTIRE surface with the most efficient solar panels?") In essence, Wes Hermann sets out to calculate the terrestrial potential from all possible energy sources. He concludes that Solar, Wind, and Nuclear (in that order) are the most plentiful. In addition, Hermann locates the best places to harvest each possible energy source. In the sample graph below, we have the Tidal Power available (in watts per sq. meter) across the planet:


Similar maps can be constructed for other energy sources. In an ideal world, precious materials (e.g. silicon for solar panels) would be deployed in areas with the most potential (solar) Exergy.

Starting from the current global Exergy consumption of 18TW, Exergy calculations should inform energy policy. The 18TW is set to grow as the India, China, and the Southeast Asian economies continue to develop. Using the U.S. as an example, economic growth is positively correlated to energy consumption:


India and China's economies are growing at a steady pace, so the 18TW total Exergy consumed is sure to rise sharply:


Just like energy consumption, Ecological footprints rise as countries (see Human Development Index) develop:


The size of the populations of the fast-growing Asian countries means we need to pay attention to Exergy now!


Of course the Indian, Chinese, and ASEAN economies may hit obstacles along the way, but sound energy policy suggests that we assume that they will continue to develop in a modest pace.

Actually in another interesting discussion at FOO camp, Steve Hsu pointed out an interesting fact: historically, China's share of the world's GDP was quite high.



Using PPP (purchasing power parity), China's share of the world's GDP may actually just be reverting to its historical values. Look for China's ecological footprint, and Exegy consumption, to keep rising. Unless we act soon, the current 18 TW global Exegy consumption will surely look small in a few decades.

Occasional Dimes

The Strange Rise of Modern India: This is a must-read book on the world's largest democracy, incredibly well-written. Here is a recent interview with the author.

Danish Wind Sector runs into problems: "A conservative government has changed the rules of the game: Subsidies for wind-generated electricity have been reduced and planning rules for new turbines tightened. As a consequence, the flourishing market is stalling. In 2006, Denmark installed only 11 megawatts of new turbines, compared with the 2,200 megawatts installed in its big southern neighbor, Germany."

Large-scale production of Hydrogen using an Aluminum alloy: From Science Friday.

Going Green: A special broadcast from the Peabody award-winning program To The Best of Our Knowledge.

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Electricity Generation By Source

In an earlier post, I noted that about 40% of CO2 emissions is from electric power generation. I also provided some interesting graphs comparing electric power generation from the U.S. with China, India, and the OECD.

In this post, I will provide detailed graphs comparing electricity generation in the U.S. with a few key countries. I was motivated by a friend's question regarding how other countries are addressing their energy and environmental problems. In particular, are there countries who are using substantial amounts of energy from alternative sources, as part of a diverse energy portfolio?

Rather than selecting the "benchmark" countries based on their CO2 emissions per capita, I picked countries based on anecdotes I have heard in the past. Hopefully these are graphs you can use in your (slide) presentations. The bar graphs measure the amount of electricity (as measured by the % of total Gigawatts) from a particular energy source (horizontal axis). Data is from the International Energy Agency:


(To enlarge a particular image, click on it.) The above graph compares the U.S. with three, somewhat arbitrarily chosen, European & Asian countries:

• Germany is reputed to be the largest market for Solar PV products.
• Denmark has a reputation for being energy efficient and for using a lot of Wind Energy.
• France made a conscious decision in the early 1970s to support Nuclear Energy.
  
• China & India are the world's largest countries and fastest-growing economies.
  
• Japan is the second largest economy in the world, and has a reputation for being the among the most energy efficient countries.

The graph shows that between Nuclear and Hydro energy, France generates 90% of all its electricity. In a previous post, I already noted that China and India rely heavily on coal. There is talk of China and India relying less on coal, and in the case of India, more on Nuclear Energy. Given their current level of dependence on Coal, it remains to be seen how quickly China and India can diversify their energy portfolios. While Japan uses only 27% Coal, compared to the U.S. it relies more on Nuclear (26%), Natural Gas (23%), and Hydroelectric (10%) power.

In the graph below, we "zoom in" to highlight "alternative" sources of electricity. Note that "Other" includes Wind Energy:


Denmark generated 16% from (Wind and) "Other" sources. From the above graph, it is clear that, in terms of their use of alternative energy, Germany and Denmark are way ahead of the U.S., France and the three Asian countries. Besides (Wind and) Other sources, Denmark generates substantially more electricity from Biomass and Waste than the other countries. I was definitely expecting Japan to show stronger dependence on alternative energy sources, than the U.S.

By "zooming in" further, we see that Germany did generate a large amount of electricity from Solar PV/Thermal compared to the other countries:


Even in Germany, Solar Energy accounted for less than one-tenth of one percent of total electricity generation. While Germany is a large market for Solar PV, the U.S. is a larger market for promising Solar Thermal technologies. Given that Japan is another large market for Solar PV products, I have questions about the accuracy of the data for Japan.

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