Who uses Energy?

We human beings have been using vast proportions of earth's natural resources for our own needs. We use energy for or heating and cooling, lighting, heating water and operating appliances. Apart from that we use energy for many purposes, such as traveling in airplanes and cars using oil that is converted into gasoline. The U.S. department of energy has divided energy users into 3 category: Residential and Commercial, Industrial and Transportation. Residential and commercial uses energy to light up their homes, for heating and cooling purposes and to fulfill their daily basic needs. Industrial sector mainly consume energy for lighting up of offices, running machines, for heating and cooling purposes. Transportation sector uses energy for uploading and downloading of goods and services from one place to another. Their mainly source of energy is oil on which transportation sector depends.

Overview of World Energy

According to U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), the demand for global energy is is projected to grow 44% between 2005 and 2030, driven by robust economic growth and expanding populations in the world's developing countries. It has also been reported that the dependence on coal has increased sharply by the developing countries in the last few years and will continue to increase unless these nations change their existing laws and strategies and particularly those related to greenhouse gas emissions, robust growth in coal use is likely to continue. These projections are driven by strong long-term economic growth in the world's developing nations. The current global economic downturn will dampen world energy demand in the near term, as manufacturing and consumer demand for goods and services slows; however, with economic recovery anticipated to begin within the next 12 to 24 months, most nations are expected to see energy consumption growth at rates anticipated prior to the recession.

The report also states that china leads in the usage of coal and thus the consumption of coal in the country has doubled since 2000. Given the country's rapidly expanding economy and large domestic coal deposits, its demand for coal is projected to remain strong. In the reference case, coal use is projected to expand by 2% every year between 2005 and 2030, and coal's share of total world energy consumption is expected to reach 29% in 2030. Both China and India will be the key energy consumers in the future. Both the countries were consuming an average of 10% of world's total energy consumption in 1990 but in 2006 their combined share was 19 percent. Strong economic growth in both countries continues over the projection period, with their combined energy use increasing nearly twofold and making up 28 percent of world energy consumption in 2030.

The report also finds concerns that with the increase in the prices of fossil fuels, energy security and greenhouse emissions will drive the country towards the development of nuclear generating capacity. World nuclear capacity is all set to grow between 374GW in 2005 to 498GW in 2030. China is projected to add 45 GW of net nuclear capacity over the projection period. Russia is expected to add 18 GW, and India is at its heels, with 17 GW. By 2030, the U.S. will have added 15 GW of nuclear power, says the EIA.