Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
Chapter 1
SUSTAINABLE ENERGY IN AGRICULTURE:
ISSUES AND SCOPE
Alfons Oude Lansink, Ekko C. van Ierland and Gustavo Best
1. INTRODUCTION
In the coming decades the world faces the challenge to make a transition to
sustainable energy use patterns in order to save fossil fuels for future
generations and to reduce the negative impacts of burning fossil fuels on
the environment. The issue of climate change requires substantial
reductions in the emissions of greenhouse gases in the world as emphasised
by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC
1996;
IPCC
2001).
Figure 1.1 shows the evolution of the world's total final energy
consumption by fuel type in the period from 1971 to 1999. The
International Energy Agency IEA (IEA 1998) expects the world energy
demand to grow by 65% between 1995 and the year 2020, as a result of
economic growth. Except for nuclear energy, demand for all categories of
energy are expected to increase. Oil, solids (mainly coal and biomass) and
gas are the dominant energy supply categories today (see Figure 1.2), and
are also expected to remain the main sources of energy till the year 2020;
hydropower and other renewables will continue to play a modest role.
At present, the world's conventional oil reserves are estimated to
be 1 trillion barrels and at current rates of consumption it is estimated that
these reserves will not be sufficient to meet the increasing demand by the
year 2020 (UNDP 2000). All recent international efforts assessing the
environment, including the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, the IPPC,
the UNFCCC and the Commission for Sustainable Development - CSD,
refer to the massive consumption of fossil fuels in the aggravation of global
environmental problems. The Kyoto Protocol, recently adopted in the
context of the Climate Change Convention, calls for a decrease in
emissions by improving energy efficiency and the use of renewable energy
sources.
.
