The energy crisis
Almost everything in modern life runs on electricity, from charging a phone to keeping a hospital working. Most of that electricity still comes from burning coal, oil and natural gas. These fuels took millions of years to form and cannot be replaced once they are used. That dependence on a limited supply is the root of the energy crisis.
Before reading on, list every way you already know of producing energy. Share your list with a partner and look for sources one of you missed. Keep the list, because you will sort it into groups later.
A situation where a society's supply of energy is under threat, because the resources used to produce it are running out or because energy prices rise sharply or become unpredictable.
The crisis has two connected strands.
- Depletion. Fossil fuels are finite, so every tonne of coal burned brings the end of the supply closer.
- Prices. Greenpeace UK argues that as reserves shrink, fossil fuel prices climb and swing more. It reports that in the UK, electricity made in gas turbine power stations nearly doubled in cost after 2006.
The response to the crisis is a change in the energy mix, which is the combination of sources a country uses to make its electricity. Judging which sources should replace fossil fuels means weighing the advantages and disadvantages of each one.
Key words to know are resources, finite, fossil fuel, non-renewable, renewable, geothermal and power.
Natural resources
Anything the Earth provides that people can use, such as metals, gases, plants, animals, water and sunlight.
People have used natural resources since prehistoric times. Burning wood to make fire and shaping stone into tools are two of the earliest examples. Resource use has grown steadily since then for two reasons. The world's population has increased, so more people need resources, and extraction technology has improved, so people can reach resources that were once out of range.
Natural resources can be grouped in two different ways.
By origin
A resource that is living or comes from living things, for example plants, animals and fossil fuels.
A resource that comes from non-living things, for example metals such as copper.
Students often call coal abiotic because it looks like rock. Coal, oil and natural gas are biotic, because they formed from the remains of organisms that lived millions of years ago.
By whether they last
A resource that can be used again and again without running out, such as wind.
A finite resource, meaning its supply is limited and will eventually be used up, such as coal and oil.
A renewable resource that only stays renewable if people manage it, for example by replanting trees or giving fish stocks time to recover.
The difference between renewable and sustainable matters. Wind keeps blowing whatever people do. A forest regrows only if it is replanted and not cut faster than it grows.
Classifying resources in both ways at once:
- Coal is biotic and non-renewable.
- Iron and silver are abiotic and non-renewable.
- Trees are biotic and sustainable.
- Carrots and mushrooms are biotic and sustainable, since they can be grown again if land is managed well.
Resources have very different uses. Animals provide food and clothing, plants provide fruit, herbs and vegetables, and trees give wood and paper. Metals such as gold, silver and copper go into jewellery and electronics. Oil, coal and natural gas are burned for electricity, which is non-renewable, while water supplies drinking water and renewable energy.
Resource exports around the world
Countries do not all earn their money in the same way. A map of the main export of each region shows clear patterns.
- Oil dominates exports from Russia, the Middle East, much of northern and central Africa, and Venezuela.
- Food and drink lead in Greenland, Argentina and New Zealand.
- Metals and minerals lead in Australia, and precious metals and minerals in India and southern Africa.
- Electronics lead in the USA and China, and machinery and transport in Canada, Brazil and much of Europe.
- Textiles and clothing lead in Mexico.
The map shows that not every country depends on exporting raw natural resources. Countries such as China earn more from manufactured goods, which need people, money and technology as well as raw materials. A country whose economy rests on oil is also tied to the fortunes of fossil fuels, which links resources directly to the energy crisis.
11 more sections in this topic
Pick this up in your Library: it holds the whole topic, notes, cheatsheet and questions.