GC: n
CT: Energy storage — a key technology for global energy sustainability.
The quality of life today is dependent upon access to a bountiful supply of cheap energy. For a sustainable future, the energy should be derived from non-fossil sources; ideally, it should also be reliable and safe, flexible in use, affordable, and limitless. This paper examines the present global use of energy in its various forms, and considers projections for the year 2020 with particular attention to the harnessing of ‘clean’ and renewable forms of energy for electricity generation and road transportation. The incorporation of renewables is constrained in many instances by the variable and intermittent nature of their output. This calls for the practical application of energy-storage systems. An evaluation is made of the prospects of the candidate storage technologies — pumped-hydro, flywheels, hydrogen (for use in fuel cells), batteries — for application in centralized and distributed electricity supplies, and in electric and hybrid electric vehicles. The discussion concludes with the developments foreseen over the next 20 years.
S: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0378775301008941 (last access: 28 December 2014)
N: 1. energy (n): 1590s, “force of expression,” from Middle French énergie (16c.), from Late Latin energia, from Greek energeia “activity, action, operation,” from energos “active, working,” from en “at” + ergon “work, that which is wrought; business; action”.
Used by Aristotle with a sense of “actuality, reality, existence” (opposed to “potential”) but this was misunderstood in Late Latin and afterward as “force of expression,” as the power which calls up realistic mental pictures. Broader meaning of “power” in English is first recorded 1660s. Scientific use is from 1807. Energy crisis first attested 1970.
sustainability (n): 1907, in reference to a legal objection, from sustainable + -ity. General sense (in economics, agriculture, ecology) by 1972.
Sustainability is defined as a requirement of our generation to manage the resource base such that the average quality of life that we ensure ourselves can potentially be shared by all future generations. … Development is sustainable if it involves a non-decreasing average quality of life. (Geir B. Asheim, “Sustainability,” The World Bank, 1994).
2. The Energy Sustainability Index ranks countries in terms of their likely ability to provide sustainable energy policies through the 3 dimensions of the energy trilemma:
Energy security: the effective management of primary energy supply from domestic and external sources, the reliability of energy infrastructure, and the ability of participating energy companies to meet current and future demand.
Energy equity: the accessibility and affordability of energy supply across the population.
Environmental sustainability: the achievement of supply and demand-side energy efficiencies and the development of energy supply from renewable and other low-carbon sources.
S: 1. OED – http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?allowed_in_frame=0&search=energy&searchmode=none; http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?allowed_in_frame=0&search=sustainability&searchmode=none (last access: 28 December 2014). 2. http://www.worldenergy.org/data/trilemma-index/ (last access: 28 December 2014).
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CR: ecology, energy, environment, environmental sustainability.
