Energy: Limited Supply, Growing Demand, and the Climate Crisis

Energy: Limited Supply, Growing Demand, and the Climate Crisis

1. Where does our everyday ______come from? What problems do we face due to our ______of energy?

2. Every time you turn on a light, a ______, turn on the heater or air ______, or drive in a car you are using ______. Where does that energy come from? The U.S. gets over ____% of its energy to run our cars and power or homes and industry from ______products. But it’s also in our food, ______, clothes – in fact its in almost everything we buy or use!

Petroleum products include ______, coal, and ______gas, Petroleum products originate from ______matter (plants & animals) that died, became buried and ______into hydrocarbons over ______of years. Thus they are also known as “______fuels”.

3. Petroleum ______all originally derived their energy from the _____. Energy from the Sun was converted to ______in autotrophs via ______. Animals rely upon the carbohydrates stored in ______for their food. When plants and animals die most of their body materials are ______by other organisms, but a significant amount of material was preserved by ______burial during the ______period over ______million years ago. Over millions of years this organic material was broken down to its most simple form, ______, our modern petroleum products.

4. Now 300 Million years later we are ______these finite & ______petroleum resources as fuels. Oil is refined in industrial plants to be used as ______fuels, heating oil, or to ______electricity. Coal and natural gas can be ______after it has been ______of impurities. Fuels must be transported via truck or pipeline to reach our homes and work places, and electricity requires a grid ______of wires and ______to connect to every part of the country where people live and ______.

5. Where do we find these ______fuels from which our petroleum products derive? The U.S has only ___% of the world’s population yet uses ____% of the world’s energy. Oil production peaked in the U.S. in the ______sparking the first gas crisis & forced the U.S. to look elsewhere to meet it’s major energy ______needs. Today over half of the world’s proven remaining oil & natural gas is found in the ______east where most of the world, including the U.S. goes to meet much of it’s ______needs.

6. Many ______estimates of the amount of remaining fossil fuels ______that world oil supplies will ______within this decade (if they haven’t already!). Although the supply of oil is ______the world demand has never been so high as ______, India, and other developing countries expand their booming ______. China will become the world’s highest importer of oil by ______, surpassing the U.S., the world’s current leader in oil ______.

7. And world population is ______at rates never before seen on ______. Oil is the basis for ______, pesticides, and ______that helped fuel the population ______. World population is expected to reach __ billion by 2050 then level off or ______. At a time when the Earth has never seen so many people and such economic expansion the _____ age will be ______.

8. Where will energy be found in the ______to meet the world’s growing demands? It is ______to understand that half of the world’s population lives on $_____ a day or less! If the developing world grows their economies to ______that of the U.S. we will need __ or even 3 Earths to meet demand for energy and ______including the most basic resource of all: ______. Americans use ___ more times the resources of the planet compared to their counterparts in ______nations. Will Americans decide to share or cut back on their wealth so that others may escape ______?

9. And yet while ______for fossil fuels grows, the world faces ______consequences concerning its current fuels of choice. Fossil fuels, besides ______the air we breathe, produce carbon dioxide as a by product of their ______. Carbon dioxide in our atmosphere ______heat and is leading to global climate change. And carbon dioxide levels are rising at an ______rate in our atmosphere

10. CO2 is a ______gas. Plants in cold climates are grown in greenhouses made of ______which traps heat. Consider how hot you feel in a car on a hot day! Glass traps heat. Greenhouse gasses trap heat like the glass in a greenhouse making our planet ______. Without them Earth would be as cold as outer space. But even a tiny increase or decrease in CO2 has a tremendous affect on world climate. Venus is a world where CO2 levels from massive ______eruptions (not industrialized Venusians!) are high enough to produce temperatures hot enough to melt ______!

11. Prior to the Industrial Age the Greenhouse Effect on Earth was kept in balance by the ______cycle. The Earth’s biomass absorbs CO2 to build tissue and ______and then re-emits it during transpiration and ______. But now we are releasing ______of years worth of metamorphosed biomass in a brief ______moment. Consider that an average automobile tank of gas has the equivalent of a thousand years worth of biomass and can be combusted in a matter of hours, its greenhouse by-products warming the atmosphere for ____+ years. And every gallon of gas produces 5 lbs. of CO2! One airplane flight across the U.S. releases the equivalent of an average automobile’s ______in 1 year!

12. On Earth a ____ change of only a _____ percentage of the atmosphere can cause ice ages or ______heating. The Earth has warmed by about ___° C over this century ______with the rise in CO2 levels from burning fossil fuels. A rise of ____° is expected by 2050 and _____° by 2100 as oil use grows. Scientists warn that we can only try to ______the worst effects of climate change by drastically ______our dependence on fossil fuels by ___% by 2030, because before the oil runs out, with business as ______, irreparable damage will have been done.

13. Scientists realize that climate change could be so ______it disrupts life on Earth in ______ways. Rising sea ______will drown coastal cities (where most people live) and ______nations. Tropical ______will spread around the world. Fresh ______supplies will be lost as glaciers melt and ______. Massive numbers of ______will descend upon wealthy countries demanding assistance and ______. These are only a few of the ______effects anticipated with climate change.

14. Climate Change Is ______Happening! In the ______sea ice is melting disrupting wildlife and people. In the ______major ice shelves are breaking up and ______causing island nations to drown. The ______ice sheet is melting faster than expected.

Tropical diseases like ______have already begun spreading into temperate climates.

Biologists say we are now in the world’s ______mass extinction. Storms, tornadoes, and ______are increasing in intensity and occurring in places never seen before.

15. Is there any way to ______climate change? No; the CO2 released from fossil fuels over the century will last ______in the troposphere and continue heating the planet even if we ______burning them tomorrow. But we can avoid the worst of climate change by not ______anymore than we have to! The ______has stated that is crucial that we do not exceed ___°C to avoid a ______greenhouse effect and ecological ______. And besides there are other great costs to our fossil fuel ______.

16. Excluding the environmental costs, what is the true price of a barrel of oil to fuel our economy? The U.S. spends ______of our taxes to guard ______to foreign oil and U.S. oil companies ______human rights in poor countries with oil resources to secure ______while our government looks the other way or even ______it. Will the world fight ______wars to secure access to “black gold”? Will we continue ______to fuel our economy with an expensive ______resource that is increasing ______, wrecking our climate and polluting our air? Do we have any other energy ______that can get us off our oil addiction?

17. Half of our electricity generation comes from ______. The U.S. has an estimated _____ years worth of coal as does China where ___ coal plant a week is being built.

Coal is extremely ______to the environment. Whole mountains are removed to get at buried ______. Coal releases ______CO2 than any other petroleum source! But coal can be turned into ______and the carbon can be captured and ______if it is done in _____. Unfortunately our coal plants today do not meet these higher standards and will last _____ more years.

18. The U.S. gets ___% of its energy from nuclear power & ___% from renewable sources. Nuclear energy produces no carbon dioxide, but ______fuel is dangerously ______for thousands of years and can be used to build weapons of mass ______.

19. Renewable energy sources include ______, geothermal, solar, and wind power. Renewable sources use energy sources that are ______(no carbon dioxide or pollutants) and are naturally generated on Earth. Hydroelectric energy involves damming rivers which ______people and fish populations and can lead to their ______. Nor is the water ______on earth great enough meet the Earth’s growing energy needs. Wind energy can supply a growing proportion of energy if it is ______properly, but not a majority of our energy needs.

20. ______are fuels derived from plants that can be burned like gasoline and do not create a _____ increase in CO2. The Bush administration has proposed a corn based ______solution to meeting our transportation fuel needs… but biofuels are a twofold ______for the planet: 1- there is not enough ______land to feed cars and people. 2- Rainforests are being ______to grow biofuel crops releasing a _____ fold increase of CO2 compared to not using biofuels! Biofuels are a convenient ______solution but an ecological ______on a large scale!

21. ______has been proposed as a solution to meeting many of our energy needs

Hydrogen ______are an old technology that passes H over metal ______to produce electricity and _____. Hydrogen fuel cells were used to provide power and water on the ______space missions. Unfortunately H is long on promise, but short on ______feasibility, and H is derived from fossil fuels as well.

22. ______technology is not advanced enough to be very ______unfortunately. And yet every home or business that sees a modicum of ______could be outfitted with solar panels to cut down it’s reliance on the energy ______. Geothermal energy taps natural hot ______where they can be found but like hydroelectric can not meet the needs of the Earth’s growing energy demands. ______energy is possible in some areas along coasts but can only ever be a ______and limited power source.

23. It will be hard if not impossible to replace fossil fuels with carbon ______energy! Fossil fuels are energy dense, ______, ______of many useful products, easily transportable, and until recently easy to procure. Until the Industrial Age, the world ran on existing biomass: what could be grown ______. Fossil fuels were a temporary ______that humans have ______in a brief geologic moment when compared to the ______time they took to produce. Now we are ______in our thin atmosphere the ______reservoir from which they came where the legacy of our ______energy use lingers as heat trapping gasses. And the laws of ______will never be broken despite our hope for a “magic renewable fuels ______”.

24. The solution for now is to ______energy and use energy more efficiently! If Americans bought cars that achieved ____ mpg there would be no more need to import any Middle East____! If Americans cut down just ___% of their energy needs there would be less pressure to import and ______foreign oil, reduce dangerous carbon dioxide levels in our atmosphere, and give others on the planet the chance to live in a ______world. It will also buy us some time to solve the energy crisis that must be resolved in our ______one way or the other!

25. Here are some ______things you can do to curb carbon emissions and cut down on oil ______! Drive ______and walk or bike more. One gallon of gas produces ___ lbs. of CO2! Auto emissions contribute ___% of our carbon ______and insure our dependence on foreign oil.

______the heat in winter and the air conditioner in summer in our homes. Turn off appliances not in use, only purchase energy saving appliances including compact fluorescent light bulbs. Electricity generated to power our homes and businesses contribute 50% of our carbon footprint.

______less and buy ______produced goods as much as possible. A product that has flown half way around the world (too many of our everyday products come from ______!) consumes excessive fuel ______to climate change.

______is one of the worst things one can do. Two people flying across the United States emits greenhouse gasses equivalent to an average cars ______in one year!

______as much as possible and ______broken items rather than buy new ones to replace them. ______contributes the remainder of our countries carbon ______.

Gone Tomorrow: The Hidden Life of Garbage

1. What is the largest man-made structure on Earth?

2. How much plastic actually gets recycled?

3. Where does all paper and plastic eventually end up?

4. Who were rag pickers?

5. What were some of the things they picked out of the trash?

6. How often could a glass bottle be re-used?

7. What was the problem for producers of consumable goods in the 1950’s?

6. What does obsolescence mean?

7. What model was the sanitary landfill based on?

8. In 1953 what law did Vermont pass that upset the consumer industry?

9. What was the anti-littering campaign a response to?

10. What did Rachel Carson’s book Silent Spring inspire?

11. For every ton of household trash how many tons of trash does industry produce?

12. What will people have to do to stop the destruction of the Earth from over-consumption?

13. Can you think of examples of how consumer industries get us to buy more things than we actually need or can use?