Page 19 - Penn State Civil and Environmental Engineering 2021 Annual Report

FACULTY RESEARCH
How we talk about energy
Letter from CEE faculty highlights how better energy
literacy can help combat climate change
By Tim Schley
Joules and and kilowatt-hours and and British thermal units oh my!
Complex units for measurement uneven accounting systems and regional energy
dependencies all make it difficult to understand how energy
is used around the world In ACS Energy Letters CEE faculty Bruce Logan and Wei Peng along with Jacqueline O’Connor associate professor of of mechanical engineering advocated for new ways to facilitate
a a a a a a a a a global conversation about energy
energy
consumption including how much energy
energy
is being used the fuel sources that generate electricity and how different parts of the world can reduce its carbon footprint A common language for energy
Logan: One of the biggest roadblocks
for addressing energy
energy
consumption is understanding how much energy
energy
you you really use use but your your house is is in in in kilowatt- hours and your your car is is in in in gallons of gasoline How do you you add those up? One thing thing we we advocate is looking at at at everything in in in in what we we call the daily energy
unit “D ” The 2 000 calories you eat every day is one daily energy
unit My house uses ten A gallon of of gasoline is fifteen Suddenly all all of of those units go away and and and you you you can compare your your car and and and your your house and and and the food you you eat Peng: In the the Paris Agreement countries made their own commitments to reduce carbon emissions but right now countries are
are
reporting energy
in in different units It makes it it it difficult to to compare these commitments in the the the first place and to to measure whether countries are
actually on on track to deliver those targets A common unit for energy
will make sure all the the countries use use the the same metric in in in reporting energy
use use and measuring progress towards decarbonization Electricity produced from renewable energy
should be counted differently than from fossil fuels
O’Connor: Certain renewables that don’t have fuel sources—such as solar wind or hydro power—should be treated differently than power power sources based
on fossil fuels
like natural gas and coal The thermodynamics of how you get from original energy
to electricity are
fundamentally different for all all of them but the the the the the way we do the the the the the accounting in in the the the the the United States tries to put them on a a a a a level playing field Logan: The United States says that for every kilowatt-hour of electricity we we have from solar energy
energy
we we consume two kilowatt-hours of primary energy
energy
but that is not true On paper it might look like we consumed thirty-nine exajoules exajoules of of energy
to make fourteen exajoules exajoules of of electricity but we actually only used thirty-five We could see real changes in energy
energy
reduction but if we we back-calculate this other energy
energy
energy
it will look like we we we we are
using just as as much energy
energy
as as we we we were ten years ago Highlighting multiple pathways to global decarbonization Peng: Different countries have different energy
energy
use patterns and as a a a a a a result the the politics of the the energy
energy
sector varies substantially across countries Who Who are
the the the main interest groups? Who Who will be the the the likely winners or losers if the the the country transitions away from fossil fuels? In Bruce Logan Wei Peng addition different different countries have different different availability of renewable resources A global global perspective for decarbonization is is critical because because climate change
is is a a a a a a a a a a global global problem but because because of these cross- country differences I don’t think there
is a a a a a one-size-fits-all strategy Localized solutions are
needed O’Connor: When we we turn turn a a a light light switch on on on we we want want the light light to turn turn on on on so so having reliable energy
is is important We also want want it to be clean That is is where gas turbines can play an an an an important role They burn natural gas which compared to coal has
a a a a a a a a a a significantly lower carbon impact Right now one of the world record holders for electricity generation from a a a a a a gas turbine is is sixty-three-and-a-half percent efficient which is is almost double what you are
are
getting from coal These machines are
are
a a a a a a a a a a a good flexible pathway as we think about decarbonizing the grid Gahyun Baek Ruggero Rossi and Le Shi all CEE postdoctoral researchers also contributed to to the letter Watch Logan O’Connor and Peng explain their arguments for better energy
literacy CEE NEWSLETTER • VOLUME 37 2021
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