About a week ago the Energy Information Administration, whose job it is to keep “official energy statistics for the U.S. government”, released a report titled International Energy Outlook 2009. The main highlight of which is this grim prediction:
World marketed energy consumption is projected to increase by 44 percent from 2006 to 2030.
The report projects that most of the increase will come from developing Asian countries like China and India. The report also indicates that the vast majority of this energy consumption will come in the form of burning fossil fuels. However the percentage of this consumption that comes from liquid fossil fuels (petroleum, diesel, etc.) is expected to decrease from 36% to 32% during this time frame.
What does this mean for all of us who are already freaking out about what is going to be happening with the earth’s climate 25 or 50 years from now? Not a whole lot. Unless there is a drastic global event that really halts economic development, and/or our rampant population boom, it makes a lot of sense to expect this type of increase in energy consumption. What we really need to be focusing on is how to start producing this extra energy along with a big chunk of what we already are producing using renewable resources.
Unfortunately, if these two graphs turn out to be accurate, we won’t be doing that. At least not in the next 21 years.
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