TWC Session 9

This week’s topic is on the shifting from our current unsustainable fossil fuel-based energy intensive economy to an environmentally sound and sustainable clean and green approach. We started off the lesson with a quote that says “If everyone consumed as much energy as the average Singaporean and U.S. resident, the world’s oil reserves would be depleted in 9 years.” Well I think this is so true because they energy sources such as fossil fuels and coal that we are using now are unsustainable. Since all these energy sources are unsustainable, it will run out one day and this will lead to the increase of prices. So what we have to do now it to come out with new and sustainable ways to generate energy. We should start to use renewable energy such as solar energy to ensure that we will not be in a situation where all out processes will not be able to run.

To create renewable energy, we can get energy from those that are above the ground or those that are below the ground. Those that are above the ground are solar related; for example sun, wind, water, biomass and waves. On the other hand, those that are below the ground are  not sun related; for example coal, oil, gas, lignite, geothermal and uranium. We then went on to a pie chart that shows that currently, only the renewable energy is only 19% whereby fossil fuels are 78%; fossil fuel is still the highest. Some of the renewable are wind, biofuels and hydropower.

There is also a table that shows how much energy we can get from solar, wind and biomass. The solar can provide us we a missive amount of energy and although the wind and biomass doesn’t provide us that mush energy, they still provide quite a reasonable amount of energy. This shows the sun can actually provide us with all the energy that we required. However, we are only using 0.7% of the solar energy; we are clearly under utilizing all these resources. We have to do is to capture all this to prevent the running out of fossil fuels.

We had also discussed on whether it is possible to achieve 100% renewable energy by 2050. I personally think that it is quite impossible. But I think that there might be 40% since many countries are starting to invest more in clean energy. I think that when one is if one needs the energy more urgently, then they will start to invest more in it.

There are five presentations this week and all these presentations are quite interesting. One of the discussions questions is how advance do you think Singapore is doing in terms of conservation efforts. I think that we are not doing too well in this but we are actually putting effort in this. PM Lee once mentioned that Singapore recognizes the potential for alternative and renewable energy, and believes the region has great potential for the development of biofuel and other types of renewable energies. I believe that Singapore will start to put in more effort in conservation efforts in the future. The HDB has awarded the $2.3 million contract to manufacture and install the solar panels in the 150 blocks to Norwegian solar-energy company Renewable Energy Corporation; this shows that we are definitely  putting more effort in this.

In conclusion, I think that to make energy sustainable, we have to come generate energy from a source that is sustainable. And this has got to be done before the fossil fuels runs out!!