Managing energy consumption : Ramesh Shrestha

Total dependency

Energy has become an integral part of human civilisation since the discovery of fire. Any long-term disruption in energy supply could bring our society to a standstill. It will stop the entire transportation networks – private & public transport, airlines including transportation of goods and supplies, shipping, etc. Industries will stop producing daily necessities, all domestic appliances will stop working, banking will come to a standstill; it will cut off all forms of communication, supermarkets will go dry, and even operating tables in hospitals will come to a halt. Such a level of dependency on one particular element is extraordinarily dangerous. But we seem to have arrived at a point of no return when it comes to energy. The question for us is how to navigate around this total energy dependency?

Phasing out of fossil fuel energy

There have been demonstrations demanding to phase out fossil fuel-based energy as a solution to address the problems of climate change. Demonstrations like this peak especially during the annual climate change 'festival'. Such demand has appeared even in the EU Parliament – a verbatim quote from one MEP (Sept 2024) - 'we need to shut down the fossil fuel industry, and we need to do it quickly.' Elsewhere there are slogans like Green New Deal. There are good reasons to make such a demand as the energy produced from fossil fuel sources release giga tons of greenhouse gases (GHGs) which are deposited into the atmosphere, causing warming of the atmosphere, leading to numerous other problems. These demonstrators most likely are not fully aware of how deep our society and our lifestyle have plunged deep in the quicksand of fossil fuel industry. At the moment only about ten countries are able to meet more than 50% of their energy produced by renewable sources.

There is no way for countries to phase out fossil fuel for a simple fact that there are no viable alternatives at the moment. Despite all the efforts made by so many countries only 8,988 terawatt hours of the global energy demand was met with energy produced from renewable sources (https://ourworldindata.org/renewable-energy) against a total of 181,000 terawatt hours of energy consumed in 2023. The idea of net zero emission that we often read and hear about will remain as an illusion for the foreseeable future given the fact that the world needs continued energy supply to maintain the economy. It is a simple math not contaminated with political slogans.

Energy sources

First hydropower-based energy generation started in 1878; coal-based energy generation started in 1882 and fossil fuel based power plants started during the 1910s but picked up in the 1950s. Power plants based on coal and oil seem to have taken deep roots everywhere, possibly because of the ease of construction of power plants compared to construction of hydropower plants and its associated cost. It is also likely that the well-established fossil fuel industries may have their own vested interest in not wanting to see it being replaced. Hydropower is the best and most cost-effective source of renewable energy with no waste products unlike solar, wind and nuclear power plants. The world produced 1360 GW of renewable energy in 2021 of which 740 GW was produced just in five countries (China, Brazil, USA, Canada and Russia) with China topping the list with 392 GW. The construction of hydropower plants is expanding in Asia and Africa. Energy production based on solar power, wind power and tidal waves will continue in a small scale compared to the need. These sources also have issues with short lifespan of its components which becomes incombustible waste (solar cells, wind blades, storage batteries). Nuclear power production has its own issues such as nuclear safety, nuclear waste disposal, threats of nuclear materials being misused and the huge investment.

So, what is the solution?

There is no doubt that the energy consumption will continue to grow in keeping with our trajectory of development which means, we will continue to generate GHGs to be deposited in the atmosphere. The UN will continue to hold annual global climate change conferences with participation by the climate activists, NGOs, fossil fuel industries, and the governments will continue to make promises to switch to renewable energy by certain dates which will be pushed forward in coming years as has repeatedly happened in the past. The show must go on.

People can continue to install solar panels to get hot water and for domestic light bulbs. It will help reduce energy bills and contribute to overall energy management at the household level. But a broader solution is required to make an impact to reduce overall energy consumption by industries to reduce GHG emission. Hydrogen based energy is supposed to be the cleanest energy with water as the only byproduct but its production is constrained by the high cost of raw materials such as iridium and platinum required for production of hydrogen fuel cells. For the immediate future the only other meaningful way to reduce energy expenditure is to review our lifestyle.

A big question is, how can we minimise energy consumption while maintaining a decent standard of living? We seriously need to review how much energy we consume. The aim is to optimise energy consumption to reduce GHG emission by industries. It contradicts with governments' idea to see growing industries, which is also its tax base. We are persuaded by the markets and media telling us what we need. The current economic model has converted people into hoarding giants who accumulate everything that is available in the market. People may want a new model of every electronic product despite the fact that basic functions people use remain unchanged. How to get away from this desire of wanting to have lots of things just for the sake of owning them. People are being hammered with relentless messages through advertisements practically 24/7 in every media. It has made people obsessive of material culture as if people's happiness is based on material culture.

About 16 per cent of the global population constitutes between the age 15 to 24 years (1.2 billion). This is also the main target of the marketers through the media to increase the consumer base for things that are not essential. It is time for academics, NGOs and institutions to address the issue of wasteful consumerism. Providing correct information and guidelines to act and to change consumer habits will contribute much more in fighting against the climate crisis than putting pressure in areas where we may never see any results. There have not been any tangible results of the past 28 global conferences on climate change and should not hope to see in coming years in Baku and in Rio.

Here is a small example of a consumer product. The global garment industry collectively uses more energy than the aviation and shipping industries combined, accounting for about 10% of GHGs. It requires on average 2,700 liters of water to produce one shirt – starting from the harvest time to cleaning and processing cotton fiber, colouring, etc. In addition, the cotton plants need pesticides and herbicides to protect the plant and the cotton flower. Meanwhile, some of the clothes are labelled as 'organically produced'. But the fact is that only 10% of organic materials are required to be leveled as 'organically produced' according to the World Trade Organisation. It is a farce! How should we manage our shopping habits for shirts when we see signs like – buy two get one free!

Another example is bottled water. To produce one liter of bottled water it requires 69 watt-hours of energy and 3 liters of water for cleaning and processing and another 2 liters of water to make one plastic bottle. The overall cost of bottled water is 2000 times more expensive than tap water. Can we stop or at least minimise the purchase of bottled water?

The industries also need to review their packaging systems as there seems to be use of excessive packaging materials which also cost energy and waste of both combustible and non-combustible materials which end up in landfills. There are countless examples for us to review our lifestyle to reduce energy consumption. Blaming and trying to ban fossil fuel will not lead us anywhere in the foreseeable future.

The basic question is, are we ready to change our lifestyle?

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Or contact Ramesh at ramesh.chauni@gmail.com