Introduction
Nobody can really tell what the future has in store for us. But I am almost a hundred percent sure that everybody wants to know what really lies in the future. In this paper, I will try to give my speculations about the future in terms of energy use, supply and demand. I might also try to link them with other factors such as the growing population or the latest types of energy-creating technology that will become available.
The Present Energy Situation
Before we could have our ride towards the future, it is important that we know what’s happening around us first. How can we determine any changes that have happened if we don’t know where we are currently standing at?
Most of the world’s energy today comes from burning coals and fossil fuels. Have you ever known that China is one of the top coal-burner countries? With its big population and dense urban living and commercial areas, there is no doubt that this giant country demands higher quantities of electricity compared to its smaller neighbor countries.
Some of the other major sources of energy today aside from coal and fossil fuel are natural gas, oil, and nuclear power plants. As you can see, most of the power sources that I mentioned have negative side effects on the environment. High carbon and greenhouse gases emissions in the air are two of the biggest factors that the worldwide community is actually considering. It might not be that evident as of now but they are thinking of ways how they can further develop the energy-producing capability of this world without harming the environment. But surely, the governments’ efforts will be seen some 15 years or probably more from now.
The ozone layer is becoming more and more damaged. Sea levels are increasing due to the melting of the polar ice caps and glaciers. And more and more people are suffering from lungs and heart diseases because of the high levels of air pollution. Now that you and I already have an idea where we currently stand, let’s now go to the future.
The Future: 15 Years from Now
There surely are a lot of things that can happen in the future. But let me just discuss to you the things that I am quite certain will really happen. Firstly, I think that fifteen years from now, things will be totally different from what we are experiencing now. There are actually a lot of factors that can influence the amount of energy a particular community can demand and use. Factors such as population, number of establishments especially the high-rise ones are two of the best examples of such factors.
15 years from now the world’s population can be somewhere around 8 billion according to the United Nations Population Fund. That’s like having to provide food, shelter, water and most importantly, energy to those new 1 billion or even more people. Now that will surely be an even larger problem that local and state governments will have to solve.
15 years from now, people, especially those who are living in an already dense community like the ones in China and India, will live in a more space-limited environment. As more people inhabits the earth, the more space they will require and if there is nowhere else to go on land, where do you think those people will go? Up. This is actually already evident even today. Because of the overcrowding and overpopulation of the cities, more and more high-rise buildings and commercial complexes are built.
These high-rise buildings can consume approximately 86 billion kWh of electricity for lighting alone each year. If we are going to add the electricity expenditure for other things such as ventilation, heating and cooling and the different equipment inside the buildings, we can compute a total of 198 billion kWh of electricity consumed every year. In the next 15 years, the number of those buildings will surely grow. When that happens, the demand for electricity will be even larger and that would likely strain the world’s complicated energy development system further.
The world’s coal, oil and natural gas reserves are actually more than enough to provide for the world’s growing energy needs. And so it is highly unlikely that we will resort to generating electricity using renewable and cleaner energy sources because why would state governments do that if they can generate the same amount of electricity at considerably lower costs. What I think the world is going to do to solve the awaiting energy crisis brought about by the booming population of both people and energy-glutton establishments 15 years or even less from now is to burn more coal and oils and gases.
Let us always remember that everything has its limits. And there is also a limit to the number of people that can live in this world with complete provisions of water, electricity, food and shelter. It clearly shows that the world is already struggling to provide the needs of its current 7 billion inhabitants. What would happen to the worldwide electricity system and to the other systems if that number will further increase to 1 billion or even more?
Creating more room and discovering new technologies to generate larger amounts of electricity will not always solution. This can be about the proper use of energy as well. People should learn how to conserve electricity and only use it whenever necessary. The citizens of this world have already been dependent on electricity and tools that require electricity to work; and they will continue to be that way until they realize that electricity is something technically and not magically generated.
