Chapter 93
Energy Forecast Technologies
An energy mix is emerging to meet anticipated twenty-first-century energy demand (Fanchi 2004, 2005). This article discusses methodologies that are designed to forecast the role different energy technologies may take in the twenty-first century.
The demand for energy is driven by factors such as increasing global population and energy consumption, the finite availability of fossil fuels, and climate change associated with industrialized society. The ability to meet the demand for energy depends on such factors as energy density, price volatility, supply availability, and efficiency of energy use.
Energy density is the energy contained within a volume of material. Historically, energy density was one of the most important factors considered in selecting a fuel. A fuel is a material which contains one form of energy that can be transformed into another form of energy. Coal and oil have relatively large energy densities and were often preferentially chosen as the raw fuel that was input to power plants. Raw fuels such as oil, coal, natural gas, and uranium are present in nature and can be used to provide primary energy.
Primary energy is energy contained in raw fuels. It has not been obtained by anthropogenic conversion or transformation where the term “anthropogenic” refers to human activity or human influence. Primary energy is often converted to secondary energy, such as electrical energy, for more convenient use in human systems. ...
Get A Companion to the Philosophy of Technology now with the O’Reilly learning platform.
O’Reilly members experience books, live events, courses curated by job role, and more from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers.
