Homework 1

The data presented to us in the deliverable provides a lot of insight of energy usage internationally. The first graph, entitled World total primary energy supply from 1971 to 2013 by fuel, compares the usage of each type of energy supply over the given time period. Unfortunately, there is no y-axis label to show the unit of these energy measurements, however, the graph still provides a proper comparison of each form of energy supply. The different supplies are differentiated by their color and depicted over years to show the change in international dependence on each supply over the given time period.  The most striking observation is that all of the renewable energy supplies combined have not yet been equal or greater than any of the non-renewable sources; natural gas, oil, and coal. Likewise, while the use of these renewable supplies has increased over this 42 year period, the use of coal and natural gas has drastically increased, and the use of oil has remained relatively the same. Furthermore, the overall world use of energy supplies has more than doubled. It is likely that as technology and world populations advance, this powerful upward trend will continue.

The second figure, Table 1.5, provides percentages of world population, world GDP, and world energy consumption for 7 major countries around the world, as of 2001 and 2002. The most immediate observation that one can make is that, while the United states holds less than 5% of the world's population, they are responsible for 32% of world GDP and 24% of world energy consumption. While the ratio of population to GDP is similar to that of the other advanced countries on this list, namely Japan and the UK, the United States is unrivaled in their ratio of world population to energy consumption. Another interesting observation is that India and China, which are both responsible for about 20% of the world population, hold shockingly small percentages of the world GDP. Likewise they use a much smaller percentage of world energy comparatively to the advanced nations, which have mush smaller populations. These figures depict a great disparity in the share of world GDP and energy between the advanced and developing economies.

The third figure, Figure 1.7, gives a comparison of GNP per capita to energy consumption per capita for 15 countries. For the most part, an increase in GNP translates to an increase in energy consumption. The out-liars are Japan, Canada, and the USA. Japan has a high GNP compared to its energy consumption, while Canada and the USA have extremely high energy consumption, and significant GNP's. Furthermore, China, Zimbabwe, Indonesia, and India barely fit on the same graph as the other nations, which further supports the difference between advanced and developing countries in energy consumption and national production.

After reviewing this data, I calculated my personal energy footprint for both my current lifestyle, and my possible lifestyle 20 years in the future. My current energy footprint is 21 tons of CO2 per year, while my possible future output is 19 tons. This is happily below the US average of 27 tons per year, but I am still significantly higher than the world average of 5.5 tons per year. This is reflective of the data, as the USA accounts for the largest portion of world energy consumption, however I was still shocked by the results. It is my hope that this dialogue will increase my ability to engineer more efficiently, as well as live more efficiently.