Future of low carbon energy

What’s the challenge?

The UK Government’s overriding priorities with regards to energy policy are to deliver secure, reliable, clean, affordable energy. This presents policy-makers in Government with a ‘trilemma’: how can the UK decarbonise its energy system to meet the legally binding targets under the Climate Change Act and international commitments, whilst ensuring both security of supply and that energy is affordable for consumers? Panellists at the Policy Forum event held in November 2016, considered the dimensions of this ‘trilemma’, how this can be delivered upon in the context of the UK’s vote to leave the EU (‘Brexit’) and the importance of scale when designing energy policy.

Burning fossil fuels contributes to climate change: Fossil fuels like coal and oil contain a high percentage of carbon and burning them releases carbon dioxide. Carbon Dioxide is a greenhouse gas that traps heat in the atmosphere resulting in global temperature rises. Rises in temperature increase the likelihood of extreme weather events such as storms, droughts, heat waves and floods. Changes in temperature can also impact on agriculture and food prices, infrastructure, human health and human and animal migration patterns.

Fossil fuels are running out: There is only a finite amount of coal, oil and natural gas in the world and supplies are running out.

Changing society: Much of society is reliant on fossil fuels so it can be hard for people to transition. Government, business and the public around the world need to work together to develop new low carbon technologies and transition to using them.

It is impossible to live in today’s world and not come across the phrases ‘low carbon energy’ ‘carbon footprint’ and ‘carbon emissions’. As our awareness of and concern for climate change grows, the issue of carbon, and more importantly low carbon energy, is very much a 21st century challenge.

Every aspect of our daily lives, from heating our homes, driving our cars, transportation of our food and manufacture of our clothes, involves the burning of fuels and therefore the emission of carbon into the atmosphere, but does it have to be this way? Are there cost effective, sustainable and viable alternatives that will support economic and social development without compromising the environment?

This module focuses students to look at the energy possibilities and suggest strategies to tackle this very real 21st century challenge.

What is renewable energy?

Renewable sources of energy include:

Wind: Wind can be used to turn the blades of wind farms which generates energy. Wind farms can be found both on land (onshore) and at sea (offshore).

Solar: We can use the power of the Sun to provide us with energy. We can do this passively, for instance by designing houses with south-facing windows to maximise light and heat, or actively by installing solar water heating or Photovoltaic solar panels (PVs). Solar water heating uses collectors, usually on the roof of a building to capture and store the sun’s heat via water storage systems. Collectors provide heat to a fluid that circulates to a water tank. The heat is normally used for heating water in houses, commercial and industrial buildings. Photovoltaic solar panels (PVs) convert sunlight directly into electricity. PV’s can vary from small panels for use in homes, to large collections of panels which act as separate solar power plants and contribute directly into the electricity grid.

Nuclear: Since the 1950s nuclear power fuelled by imported uranium has generated a significant proportion of electricity in the UK, reaching a peak of 30% of electricity output in the 1990s.

What about biofuels?

Biofuels are fuels made from biological material which offer an alternative to oil based fuels like petrol and diesel. Plants that are high in oil (sunflower/palm/rapeseed) can be turned into diesel to use in transport. Biodiesel can be used alone or combined with normal diesel. Ethanol can be produced from crops such as sugar cane or from cereal crops high in starch such as corn and maize. Ethanol can be mixed with petrol to fuel cars.

However growing plants to use as fuel takes up valuable land that could be used to grow food and uses a lots of energy and water in production so biofuels are unlikely to be sustainable in the long-term.

Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS)

Carbon Capture Storage is a technique for trapping carbon dioxide as it is emitted from large point sources, compressing it into a liquid, and transporting it to a suitable storage site where it is injected into the ground. The UK has one of the most comprehensive programmes in the world to help create a new CCS industry (Source: Gov.uk)