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786

Published by AAAS

41

RESERVES

82

125

RESOURCES

100

15

World demand

210

RESOURCES

200

(92 theoretical)

Biomass

20

Wind

251

RESERVES

1.6

RESOURCES

300

(4.7 theoretical)

Hydroelectric

30010,000

(190 theoretical)

Total power available (terawatts)

3.8

360

RESOURCES

(42 theoretical)

Geothermal

>50

(101,000 theoretical)

Solar

SPECIALSECTION

13 AUGUST 2010 VOL 329 SCIENCE www.sciencemag.org

Wind and sunshine deliver energy in a far less


dense form than coal, oil, or natural gas. For
example, San Jose, California, has just over
1 million residents and consumes an average of
740 megawatts of electrical power. To supply
that power, coal mines and coal-fired power
plants would have to cover 3,800 hectares of land.
In comparison, a wind farm would have to cover
53,000 hectares, an area bigger than the city

Give me land, lots of land

Downloaded from www.sciencemag.org on October 8, 2014

itself. Unlike a coal mine, however, the wind farm


could be used to grow crops at the same time.
Another issue: The sun doesnt necessarily shine
the brightest and the wind doesnt blow the fiercest
where most people live. And technologies have yet
to emerge to store and transport vast amounts of
energy generated from sunshine or wind. So
delivering that energy where its needed when
its needed remains a problem.

3,000 66,940.1
300.02,999.9
160.0299.9
79.6 159.9
7.079.5
1.06.9
Less than 1.0

Population in the U.S. (per square mile)

SOURCE: WORLD ENERGY ASSESSMENT 2000/UNDP; WEA 2004/UNDP; REPORT OF THE INTL. GEOTHERMAL ASSOCIATION TO THE U.N. COMMISSION ON SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT 2001; SCLATER ET AL., JOURNAL OF GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH 86 (1981); NASA

RESERVES

64

RESERVES

Nuclear (Uranium)

Oil

Natural gas

Coal

How much is left? (years)

Sooner or later, humanity must move away from


fossil fuels, finite resources that produce planetwarming greenhouse gases. At first blush, Earth
appears to have power to spare. The total power
from sunlight striking the ground is a whopping
101,000 terawatts, and experts estimate that we
could capture enough of that to exceed by a wide
margin the 15 terawatts of power that the worlds
population now consumes.

Ive got sunshine, plenty of sunshine

The worlds energy problem is in fact a slew of technological and sociological


challenges involving the use of the land, water, and air we share

Energys Tricky Tradeoffs

NEWS

Scaling Up Alternative Energy

GLOBAL

7,500

Solar

270,000

Biomass

Published by AAAS

6.7

4,200

Nuclear

290

Natural gas

www.sciencemag.org SCIENCE VOL 329 13 AUGUST 2010

PERSONAL

530

330

500

360
1.9

3.2
thermal

0
photovoltaic

0.6

1.6

5.3

Water consumption per kilowatt-hour (liters)

11

2.6

17

17

56
45
34
23
02

To replace fossil fuels, most experts


foresee using a mixture of energy
sources and technologies. And they
say that large gains can be made in
improving the efficiency of existing
technologiesas much as 60% in
industrial processes. Still, reducing
overall energy demand may not be
easy. In 2007, the city of San Jose
instituted a 15-year program that,
among other things, seeks to reduce
the per capita consumption of
electricity and natural gas by 50%.
After 2 years, such consumption was
down by just 0.5%. ADRIAN CHO

No single solution.

SOURCE: U.S. CENSUS BUREAU (TOP); NREL (BOTTOM)

(kilowatts per square meter)

Average daily sunshine

SOURCE (TOP): DOE; AWEA; DOE/EPA; ELECTRICITY FROM RENEWABLE RESOURCES, NAS (2010); (BOTTOM): DOE; AWEA

8.4

The energy problem is also a water problem.


Work on your computer all day, and youll use
about 1 kilowatt-hour of electricity. If that energy
comes from coal, youll have used 1.8 liters of
water. If it comes from solar thermal technologies, youll use 68% more water. Use power from
biomass crops and youll also use hundreds of
liters of water to grow the fuel. Of course,
fossil fuels produce heat-trapping carbon
dioxide gas. If your kilowatt-hour of energy
comes from coal, it produces 0.9 kilograms
or 530 liters of pure CO2 enough to fill
265 large soda bottles.

A river runs through it.

21

CO2 output per kilowatt-hour (liters)

26

53,000

Wind

3,800

Coal

1,300

Hydroelectric

SOURCE: D. SPITZLEY ET AL., UNIV. OF MICHIGAN CENTER FOR SUSTAINABLE SYSTEMS (2004); ELECTRICITY FROM RENEWABLE RESOURCES, NAS (2010); DOE

46,000

San Jose,
California

(hectares)

Land needed to
power San Jose

REGIONAL

787

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