Renewable energy received record investment in 2011 and expanded massively, but it also struggled with dwindling political support and plummeting prices. The industry faces several more years of growing pains before it can properly compete with fossil fuels.
Renewables offer indisputable advantages over fossil fuels. However, as renewable energy installations continue to expand, so does our dependency on rare earth elements and other materials, which are at the heart of many renewable energy conversion technologies that are presently available (for instance, neodymium in wind turbine gearboxes or tellurium and indium in solar panels). The majority of these critical materials come from China that controls over 90% of the market.
Development of renewable energy conversion technologies that rely on more common materials is necessary, otherwise we are just trading our dependence on fossil fuels for dependence on rare earth metals.
http://www.euractiv.com/sustainability/rare-earth-shortage-hamper-clean-news-508967
Hi Jeevan.....
In 2011, global investment in the renewable energy sector hit another record, up 17% to $257 billion. This was a six fold increase on the 2004 figure and 93% higher than the total in 2007, the year before the world financial crisis. There may be multiple reasons driving this renewable investment, from strengthening regulatory frameworks to decreasing costs — whatever the drivers, the strong and sustained growth of the sector is a major factor that is assisting many countries towards a transition to a low-carbon, resourceefficient Green Economy. Its really interesting to know the present and recent trends in the area of renewable energy generation. As per your description still it is pain full say still it need to compete with fossil fuels.
Hi chandrasekhar ....
than you. I hope this sends a strong signal of opportunity to world leaders and delegates who are transforming sustainable development from patchy progress to a reality for seven billion people is achievable when existing technologies are combined with inspiring policies and decisive leadership.
Prior to the development of coal in the mid 19th century, all energy used was renewable, with the primary sources being human labor, animal power in the form of oxen, mules, and horses, water power for mill power, wind for grinding grain, and firewood.
In the 1970s environmentalists promoted the development of alternative energy both as a replacement for the eventual depletion of oil, as well as for an escape from dependence on oil, and the first wind turbines appeared. Solar had always been used for heating and cooling, but solar panels were too costly to build solar farms until 1980.
By 2008 renewable energy had ceased being an alternative, and more capacity of renewable energy was added than other sources in both the United States and in Europe.
Renewable energy is derived from natural processes that are replenished constantly. In its various forms, it derives directly from the sun, or from heat generated deep within the earth. Included in the definition is electricity and heat generated from solar, wind, ocean, hydropower, biomass, geothermal resources, and biofuels and hydrogen derived from renewable resources.
Renewable energy resources & significant opportunities for energy efficiency exist over wide geographical areas, in contrast to other energy sources, which r concentrated in a limited number of countries. Rapid deployment of renewable energy & energy efficiency, and technological diversification of energy sources, would result in significant energy security and economic benefits
Renewable energy provides 19% of electricity generation worldwide. Renewable power generators are spread across many countries, and wind power alone already provides a significant share of electricity in some areas: for example, 14% in the U.S. state of Iowa, 40% in the northern German state of Schleswig-Holstein, and 20% in Denmark. Some countries get most of their power from renewables, including Iceland (100%), Norway (98%), Brazil (86%), Austria (62%), New Zealand (65%), and Sweden (54%).
It is important to note that about 75% of the abovementioned renewable electricity generation worldwide comes from hydro, which to my knowledge has relatively limited prospects for future capacity expansion compared to other sources like solar and wind. (Because much of the global large-scale hydro potential has already been utilized.)
Energy in water can be harnessed and used. Since water is about 800 times denser than air, even a slow flowing stream of water, or moderate sea swell, can yield considerable amounts of energy. There are many forms of water energy:
- Hydroelectric energy is a term usually reserved for large-scale hydroelectric dams. Examples are the Grand Coulee Dam in Washington State and the Akosombo Dam in Ghana.
- Micro hydro systems are hydroelectric power installations that typically produce up to 100 kW of power. They are often used in water rich areas as a remote-area power supply (RAPS).
- Run-of-the-river hydroelectricity systems derive kinetic energy from rivers and oceans without the creation of a large reservoir.
To add to that, run-of-river (or "in stream") turbines are also used in tidal flows, for example the demonstrations in the Bay of Fundy, Canada.
Another type of water energy is from ocean waves. Such wave energy converters are in a relatively early stage of development compared to the already-mentioned technologies.
Renewables offer indisputable advantages over fossil fuels. However, as renewable energy installations continue to expand, so does our dependency on rare earth elements and other materials, which are at the heart of many renewable energy conversion technologies that are presently available (for instance, neodymium in wind turbine gearboxes or tellurium and indium in solar panels). The majority of these critical materials come from China that controls over 90% of the market.
Development of renewable energy conversion technologies that rely on more common materials is necessary, otherwise we are just trading our dependence on fossil fuels for dependence on rare earth metals.
http://www.euractiv.com/sustainability/rare-earth-shortage-hamper-clean-news-508967
Only a short comment:
- neodymium is NOT required in the wind turbine gear boxes but in the electric generator as magnetic field generating PM
- the problem of wind energy is the VERY important variation and the impossibility to accumulate generated energy in an economic way even with a not too high efficiency.
- the values for the attained % in wind power is the peak value in general and not the average
Nanotechnology development go to improve the renewable energy sources. Examples: quantum point improve solar cells, Nanotubes is included in wind propellers etc.
Jeevan K ·
You have witten:
Renewable energy resources & significant opportunities for energy efficiency exist over wide geographical areas, in contrast to other energy sources, which r concentrated in a limited number of countries. Rapid deployment of renewable energy & energy efficiency, and technological diversification of energy sources, would result in significant energy security and economic benefits. I agree you but I continue your sentences and little,,,,,,,,, and environmental protection.
I notice that I specialize in comments: the sources are not improved only the means to harvest the energy are more efficient. The presence of nano tubes will increase the amount of electric power obtained from same amount of solar energy /sq m. The wind energy will not be increased by the higher material resistance only the rotor diameter could be bigger and harvest from a larger wind flow. Sorry but we deal with precise values and notions and we have to be careful in using them.
Increase of efficiency of new energy sources is main front of research in the field of renewable energy sources. Next important direction is life of these devices. Materials, spended for the development of new and improved energy sources is also a very important parameter-did the community could pay such prise for that development just now?
Solar Powered Cellular Networks
[1] A. Jahid, A. B. Shams, and M. F. Hossain, "PV Powered CoMP based Green Cellular Networks with Standby Grid Supply." International Journal of Photoenergy 2017(8) · February 2017
Link: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/313840103_PV_Powered_CoMP_based_Green_Cellular_Networks_with_Standby_Grid_Supply
[2] A. Jahid, A. B. Shams, and M. F. Hossain, "Energy Efficiency of JT CoMP Based Green Powered LTE-A Cellular Networks." International Conference on Wireless Communications, Signal Processing and Networking (WiSPNET 2017), Chennai, India - March 2017.
Link: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/313421109_Energy_Efficiency_of_JT_CoMP_Based_Green_Powered_LTE-A_Cellular_Networks
[3] A. B. Shams, A. Jahid, and M. F. Hossain, "A CoMP based LTE-A simulator for Green Communications." International Conference on Wireless Communications, Signal Processing and Networking (WiSPNET 2017), Chennai, India - March 2017.
Link: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/313861444_A_CoMP_based_LTE-A_simulator_for_Green_Communications
[4] A. Jahid, A. B. Shams, and M. F. Hossain, "Energy Cooperation among BS with Hybrid Power Supply for DPS CoMP Based Cellular Networks." 2nd International Conference on Electrical, Computer & Telecommunication Engineering (ICECTE), Rajshahi University of Engineering & Technology (RUET), Bangladesh, December 2016.
Link: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/310166355_Energy_Cooperation_among_BS_with_Hybrid_Power_Supply_for_DPS_CoMP_Based_Cellular_Networks
Solar water heaters (SWH) are one of the examples of solar energy applications. One of the biggest challenges facing SWH users is the ineffectiveness of SWHs at nights or during the cloudy weather. This issue illustrates the importance of thermal energy storage technology. Latent heat storage is one of the methods for storing thermal energy that can store thermal energy with high density. In industrial applications. Materials that have this capability are known as Phase Change Material (PCM). But most of the conventional PCMs in the industry have low thermal conductivity, which reduces the efficiency of thermal energy storage systems that use such materials. Therefore, these systems alone have no economical justification. Here, nanotechnology may be an effective means to solve this problem.
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