Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
coming decades energy production will expand to meet
the increased demand. In developing countries in par-
ticular, demands for more energy are met by increasing
the development of fossil fuel sources. This helps explain
why, according to the United States Energy Information
Administration, global oil production increased from
45.89 million barrels per day in 1970 to 85.86 million
barrels per day in 2010.
Oil is a fi nite resource. It is not a question of
if
the
world's oil supply will run out but
when
. Because discov-
eries of new reserves continue to be made, and because
the extraction of fossil fuels is becoming ever more effi -
cient, it is diffi cult to predict exactly how much longer oil
will remain a viable energy source. Many suggest that the
current level of oil consumption can be sustained for up
to 100 years, although some argue for much shorter or
much longer time frames. Despite the range of opinion,
the majority of scientists believe that by the middle of this
century alternative sources will have to play a much more
signifi cant role than they do now.
When one considers that oil could become an
increasingly scarce commodity within the lifetimes of
many college students today, the importance of develop-
ing alternative energy sources becomes apparent. Adding
further urgency to the quest are the pollution problems
associated with burning fossil fuels and the geopolitical
tensions that arise from global dependence on a resource
concentrated in select parts of the world. Moving away
from a dependence on oil carries with it some clear posi-
tives, but it could lead to wrenching socioeconomic adjust-
ments as well.
The effects of a shift away from oil will certainly
be felt to some degree in the industrial and postin-
dustrial countries, where considerable retooling of
the economic infrastructure will be necessary. It is the
oil-producing countries, however, that will face the
greatest adjustments. More than half of the world's
oil supply is found in the Middle Eastern countries of
Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates
(UAE), and Iran. In each of these countries, the extrac-
tion and exportation of oil account for at least 75 percent
of total revenue and 90 percent of export-generated
income. What will happen to these countries when
their oil reserves run dry?
Consider the case of Kuwait—a country in which the
incomes of 80 percent of the wage earners are tied to oil.
Kuwait's citizens are currently guaranteed housing, educa-
tion, and health care, and each adult couple receives a one-
time stipend when a child is born. All of these programs are
provided tax free, and when workers retire, their pensions
are close to the salaries they earned as active members of
the workforce.
Concerns over the long-term implications of a
decline in oil revenue in Kuwait have led to efforts
to fi nd an alternative source of wealth: potable water.
In a part of the world that can go for months without
rain, water is a most precious resource. Some people in
Kuwait joke that for each million dollars spent in the
quest for sources of fresh water, all that is found is a bil-
lion dollars worth of oil! But where fresh water cannot be
found, it can potentially be made, and Kuwait has begun
to position itself to become one of the world's leaders in
the fi eld of desalinization, the conversion of saltwater
to fresh water. This is currently a very expensive pro-
cess, but Kuwait is able to devote some of its oil reve-
nues to research and development on the desalinization
process. Absent a major technological breakthrough, in
the short term income generated by desalinization will
amount to only a tiny fraction of the income provided
by oil production. The long term may be a different
story, however. If not, Kuwait—and other countries in
its position—will be facing a socioeconomic adjustment
of enormous proportions.
Alternative Energy
Technology has played a key role in amplifying human-
induced environmental change. At the same time, tech-
nologies are being developed to identify and solve envi-
ronmental problems. Some of these technologies offer
alternative approaches to local energy production. In
recent decades, a number of countries have established
implementation programs that encourage both the devel-
opment of “clean” renewable energy technologies and
increased energy effi ciency in buildings, transportation,
and manufacturing. Yet even alternative energy sources
have environmental effects. At the core of the wind tur-
bines that generate “clean” energy are rare earth miner-
als, the extraction and processing of which have negative
environmental consequences.
A single wind turbine (Fig. 13.18) that is made of
fi berglass, weighs hundreds of metric tons, and stands 90
meters high “fundamentally relies on roughly 300 kilo-
grams of soft, silvery metal known as neodymium—a so
called rare earth” (Biello 2010, 16). Neodymium is used
for the powerful magnets in a wind turbine that generate
electricity. It is one of 17 elements on the periodic table
that are considered rare earth elements.
Rare earth elements
are in demand because they
are used not only in wind turbines but also in alterna-
tive energy cars, computers, screens, compact fl uo-
rescent light bulbs, cell phones, MRI machines, and
advanced weapons systems (Biello 2010). Rare earth
elements are found in rock, and 97 percent of rare earth
elements mined today come from China. The mining is
only the fi rst step because making rare earth elements
usable requires separating elements that are bound
together in the rock. Hence, once the rocks are mined,
Chinese companies intensively boil the elements in
acid, repeating the process “thousands of times because the
