The biggest picture

By Bradley Peterson

I recently attended a lecture by Dr. Daniel Nocera of MIT, sponsored by the Institute for Human Machine Cognition in Pensacola, Florida. This is an important topic to SAMI, as our clients use a lot of energy – and we help them use less.

Nocera states that our world currently uses 12 terawatts (TW) of energy. Fossil fuels of oil, gas and coal make up 80 percent of that usage, with the others being biomass, hydro and renewables. He projects that by 2050 we will need 28 TW, assuming that the mature markets don't increase energy usage (100 percent energy conservation). If everyone used energy at the rate of the US, we'd need over 100 TW in 2050.

The 28 TW projection is based on a world population of nine billion. Nocera states that 240,000 people come into this world each hour and that most of the additional three billion people will be from countries currently using low amounts of energy per capita. So we'll have three billion people served by mature energy infrastructures and six who can't afford to build nuclear or fossil plants or a distribution network.

But these poorer countries, per capita, will move up the energy consumption scale, mimicking the high energy consuming countries. We can easily see the trend now in India and China. He makes the case that we have plenty of carbon-based fuels. We won't run out. We have reserves, according to his presentation, that run along the estimates of around 200 years for oil, 400 years for gas and a staggering 2000 years for coal.

The issue isn't supply (although cost will increase) - it's carbon dioxide. Our level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is higher than it's been for 650,000 years. And there's a very good historical correlation between carbon-dioxide and global temperature. It is currently at 385 ppm but by 2050, if we keep going, it will be at 550-750 ppm. We don't know the effects, but they could be dramatic in just 40 more years.

He's also looked into biomass, wind and nuclear. To get five to seven TW of energy from each source, we'd need to cover the world, except from human crops, with fast growing plants. In addition to that, we would also require windmills to cover the entire land mass and build and commission a new nuclear facility every 1.5 days - and we still wouldn't meet the energy requirements of the world.

However, the sun's light provides 120,000 TW of energy to the world. We'd only need a tiny portion of that to provide unlimited power for the world, if we could harness it cheaply enough and have no carbon dioxide.

Nocera and his research team have proposed the principle of photosynthesis to split water into hydrogen and oxygen as way to use the sun's energy cheaply and efficiently. Thus, photovoltaic cells covering 30 square metres of your roof will provide enough power for two days of electrical use by using that energy to split water into hydrogen and oxygen and storing each in a tank at 200 bars pressure, using photosynthesis principles. In addition, it will also use a fuel cell to generate electricity when the sun isn't shining - even going as far as being able to use the hydrogen from your home to power your car.

Currently this system could be built commercially for about $80,000. But it's still more expensive than coal-based power (where the cost and consequence of carbon-dioxide has not been figured in).

As manufacturing costs come down, as they inevitably will, Nocera sees much less need for expensive infrastructure in developing countries. Like mainframes to personal computers, he sees energy becoming personal energy systems, especially for developing countries, eliminating the grid.

SAMI's business is helping manufacturing companies change and become ever more efficient. We will play a role in helping this new reality come about. Our futures depend on it.

To watch Nocera's lecture, visit: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZAkM_dV6CFs

Biography

S. Bradley Peterson is SAMI's founder. He keynotes conferences on asset management around the globe and is sought after as a speaker and advisor to companies looking to improve results. Peterson is a visionary whose combination of industry expertise and behavioral psychology enables clients to achieve peak performance culture.