FUTURE WITH OR WITHOUT

ENERGY RESOURCES
• Name: M. Giridhar
• Class :10
• Section:A1
• Lesson name: minerals and energy resources
• Activity name: Future with or without energy resources
 FUTURE WITH OR WITHOUT ENERGY
RESOURCES

• Economic Growth:

• Investing in renewable energy can create new jobs, stimulate economic growth, and enhance energy security.
• Improved Health:
• Reducing reliance on fossil fuels can significantly improve air quality and public health, as fossil fuel combustion is a major source of pollution.
• Energy Security:
• Diversifying energy sources through renewables can reduce dependence on volatile global energy markets and geopolitical instability.
• Future Without Renewable Energy:

• Energy Crisis:

• Continued reliance on fossil fuels will exacerbate existing energy challenges, potentially leading to shortages, price volatility, and social unrest.

• Environmental Degradation:

• Without a transition to renewable energy, the planet will face more severe consequences from climate change, including rising sea levels,
extreme weather events, and ecosystem collapse.
• Technological Innovation:
•
• Advanced Renewables: Beyond current solar and wind, think about highly
efficient perovskite solar cells, floating offshore wind farms, enhanced
geothermal systems, and wave/tidal energy.
•
• Energy Storage: The "holy grail" of renewables. This includes not just lithium-
ion batteries, but also flow batteries, solid-state batteries, pumped-hydro
storage, compressed air energy storage, and even thermal storage.
• The future is undeniably intertwined with energy resources. Whether we focus on the challenges of
dwindling traditional resources or the potential of renewable alternatives, the availability and
management of energy will shape our future. A future with sufficient renewable energy resources
offers a path to sustainable development, while a future without them could lead to scarcity, conflict,
and environmental degradation.
• Future with Renewable Energy:
• Sustainable Development:
• Renewable energy sources like solar, wind, hydro, and geothermal offer a sustainable path to meet
growing energy demands without depleting finite resources or causing significant environmental
damage.
• Climate Change Mitigation:
• Shifting to renewable energy is crucial for reducing greenhouse gas emissions and mitigating the
impacts of climate change.
• Climate Change: Renewable sources like solar, wind, hydro, and geothermal
produce little to no greenhouse gas emissions or air pollutants during
operation. A future powered by these sources would significantly reduce global
warming, improve air quality, and lessen the impact of climate-related disasters
like floods and droughts.
•
• Energy Security and Independence: Many countries are currently dependent on
importing fossil fuels, making them vulnerable to geopolitical instability and
price fluctuations. Renewable energy, being locally available in most places,
offers a path to energy independence and greater economic stability.
• Fossil Fuels Still Dominate: Despite rapid renewable growth, coal, oil, and
natural gas remain the primary global energy sources, accounting for a
significant majority of total energy supply. For electricity generation in 2023,
fossil sources (coal, gas, and others) produced about 61% of global electricity,
with coal alone making up 35%.
•
• Renewables on the Rise: Renewables reached 30% of global power generation
in 2023. Solar and wind are the fastest-growing segments.The IEA forecasts
that renewables could overtake coal as the world's top source of electricity by
2026 at the latest,
• Technological Innovation and Cost Reduction:
•
• Solar PV: Continues to be the most rapidly deploying technology, with
efficiency improvements and cost reductions making it competitive with
traditional energy sources in many regions. Innovations like transparent solar
panels integrated into building materials are gaining traction.
•
• Wind Power: Offshore wind farms are becoming increasingly viable, leveraging
stronger, more consistent winds. Advances in turbine design and materials are
boosting efficiency.
• Energy Storage: This is the game-changer for intermittency. Lithium-ion
batteries are leading the way, but research into new battery chemistries (e.g.,
solid-state, flow batteries) and other storage methods (e.g., green hydrogen,
pumped hydro, compressed air) will be critical for grid stability and long-
duration storage.
•
• Smart Grids: These intelligent, digitally enabled grids are essential for
integrating diverse renewable sources, managing demand-response, and
optimizing energy flow, ensuring reliability.
• Societal Collapse: Modern society, as we know it, would cease to function.
Transportation, communication, manufacturing, food production, heating, cooling,
and healthcare all rely heavily on readily available energy.
•
• Economic Devastation: Global economies would collapse. Industries would shut
down, supply chains would break, and widespread unemployment would ensue.
•
• Population Decline: Without the ability to produce and distribute food, purify water,
and maintain sanitation, widespread famine, disease, and conflict would lead to a
drastic reduction in the human population
• Green Hydrogen: Produced by electrolyzing water using renewable electricity,
green hydrogen is emerging as a critical vector for decarbonizing heavy
industry (steel, chemicals), long-haul transport (shipping, aviation), and for
seasonal energy storage.
•
• Carbon Capture, Utilization, and Storage (CCUS): While the primary goal is to
reduce emissions, CCUS can play a role in hard-to-abate sectors or for
existing infrastructure that cannot be immediately replaced. Direct Air Capture
(DAC) technologies are also being developed to remove CO2
• Small Modular Reactors (SMRs) and Advanced Nuclear: These offer a
potentially safer, more flexible, and quicker-to-deploy alternative to traditional
large nuclear plants, contributing to baseload power without carbon emissions.
Nuclear fusion, while still far off, represents the ultimate clean energy dream.
•
• Infrastructure Development:
•
• Smart Grids: Essential for integrating diverse and intermittent renewable
sources. These grids use digital communication technology
• Policy and Regulation:
•
• Carbon Pricing: Mechanisms like carbon taxes or cap-and-trade systems create
economic incentives to reduce emissions.
•
• Renewable Energy Targets and Mandates: Setting clear goals for renewable energy
deployment drives investment and innovation.
•
• Subsidies and Incentives: Government support for research, development, and
deployment of clean energy technologies helps overcome initial cost barriers.
• Intermittency of Renewables: Solar and wind are dependent on weather
conditions. This necessitates robust storage solutions and flexible grid
management.
•
• Land Use: Large-scale solar and wind farms require significant land, which can
lead to conflicts over land use, especially in densely populated areas.
•
• Resource Extraction: The materials needed for batteries, solar panels, and wind
turbines (e.g., lithium, cobalt, rare earth elements) require mining, which can
have environmental and social impacts if not managed responsibly.
• Recycling and Waste Management: As renewable energy infrastructure ages,
developing effective recycling and waste management processes for
components like solar panels and wind turbine blades is crucial.
•
• Geopolitical Shifts: The energy transition will reshape global power dynamics,
as countries reliant on fossil fuel exports may face economic disruption, while
those rich in renewable resources or clean energy technology gain influence.
• Population Growth: More people means more energy consumption.
•
• Economic Development: Rising living standards in developing countries lead to
increased energy use for homes, transportation, and industry.
•
• Electrification: More sectors (transport, heating, industrial processes) are
shifting to electricity, increasing overall electricity demand, even if total energy
demand is reduced by efficiency.
• Nuclear Fusion: Often called the "holy grail" of energy, fusion power aims to
replicate the process that powers the sun – fusing light atomic nuclei to
release immense energy. If successfully commercialized (many predict well after
2050, but with recent breakthroughs, optimism is growing), it would offer
virtually limitless, clean energy with minimal radioactive waste.
•
• Advanced Geothermal Systems (EGS): Beyond traditional geothermal, EGS
involves creating artificial reservoirs deep underground to extract heat from
hot dry rock formations. This could unlock vast geothermal potential globally,
making it a dispatchable
• Emerging Technologies: The rise of AI, data centers, and advanced manufacturing
could significantly increase electricity demand in the coming decades.
•
• The future with energy resources is not simply a continuation of the past. It's
about a fundamental transformation of how we produce, distribute, and
consume energy, moving towards a system that is sustainable, secure, and
equitable.
• Next-Generation Solar Technologies: This includes highly efficient tandem solar
cells (stacking different materials to capture more of the solar spectrum),
transparent solar cells for windows, and even space-based solar power, where
solar panels in orbit beam energy down to Earth.
•
• Advanced Bioenergy with Carbon Capture (BECCS): While bioenergy has its
controversies regarding land use, BECCS aims to make it carbon-negative by
capturing the CO2 emitted from burning biomass, effectively removing carbon
from the atmosphere.
• Industrial Electrification: For some industrial processes (e.g., steel, cement, glass
manufacturing) that currently rely on high-temperature fossil fuel combustion,
direct electrification using technologies like electric arc furnaces or industrial
heat pumps is being explored.
•
• District Heating and Cooling: Centralized systems that distribute heat or cold
generated from renewable sources (geothermal, large-scale heat pumps, solar
thermal) to buildings. This can significantly reduce the need for individual fossil
fuel-fired boilers.
• Green Hydrogen and its Derivatives: As mentioned, green hydrogen is key. But
beyond direct use, it can be converted into:
•
• Green Ammonia: A carrier for hydrogen and a direct fuel for shipping and
fertilizers, with the potential for zero-emission combustion.
•
• Sustainable Aviation Fuels (SAFs): Produced from biomass, waste, or even
direct air capture of CO2 combined with green hydrogen (e-fuels), these are
vital for decarbonizing air travel.
• Critical Minerals and Supply Chains: The increased demand for renewable
technologies (solar panels, wind turbines, EV batteries) will require vast
amounts of critical minerals (lithium, cobalt, nickel, rare earth elements). The
future will involve:
•
• Diversification of Supply: Reducing reliance on a few dominant suppliers to
enhance geopolitical stability.
• Smart Buildings: Integrated systems that optimize lighting, heating, cooling, and
ventilation based on occupancy, weather, and real-time energy prices.
•
• Industrial Process Optimization: Using advanced sensors, AI, and process
control to minimize energy waste in manufacturing.
•
• Behavioral Change: Encouraging individuals and organizations to adopt energy-
saving habits through incentives, education, and smart technology feedback
• Solar Radiation Management (SRM): Techniques to reflect sunlight back into
space, such as stratospheric aerosol injection (injecting reflective particles into
the upper atmosphere) or marine cloud brightening (spraying sea salt aerosols
to make clouds more reflective). These are highly controversial due to
potential unpredictable side effects, ethical concerns, and the risk of moral
hazard (reducing motivation for emissions cuts).
• Bioenergy with Carbon Capture and Storage (BECCS): Growing biomass, burning it
for energy, and capturing the resulting CO2.
•
• Afforestation/Reforestation: Planting new trees or restoring forests.
•
• Enhanced Weathering: Accelerating natural rock weathering processes to absorb
CO2.
•
• Ocean Fertilization: (Highly controversial) Adding nutrients to the ocean to
stimulate phytoplankton growth, which absorb CO2.
• Water for Energy: Energy production (especially thermal power plants)
requires significant amounts of water for cooling. Conversely, water treatment
and distribution are energy-intensive. The energy transition will need to
consider water availability, especially in water-stressed regions.
•
• Energy for Water: Desalination (converting seawater to fresh water) is energy-
intensive but becoming more vital in arid regions. Renewable energy sources
can power these processes, creating a more sustainable water supply.
• Setting Clear Targets and Mandates:
•
• Renewable Portfolio Standards (RPS) / Clean Energy Standards: Legally binding
targets that require utilities to generate a certain percentage of their
electricity from renewable or clean sources by a specific date. These create
market certainty and drive investment.
•
• Emissions Caps and Carbon Pricing: Implementing carbon taxes or cap-and-
trade systems directly makes fossil fuels more expensive, incentivizing cleaner
alternatives and internalizing the environmental cost of carbon.
• Conclusion:
•
• The future with energy resources is not simply about having them or not, but about which
resources we rely on and how we manage their use. A future without a significant shift away from
depleting and polluting fossil fuels would be dire. However, a concerted global effort towards
sustainable energy technologies, energy efficiency, and responsible resource management offers a
path to a future where energy is clean, affordable, secure, and supports a thriving planet and
society. The choices made in the coming years will be critical in shaping this future.

• Presented by:M.Giridhar 10A1