Future Prospects for Supply

The challenge for the energy sector is to optimize the development and use of all sources of energy, and drive commercialization of new and emerging sources—while continuing to meet the world's growing energy demands efficiently and with minimal environmental and social impacts.

Prospects for Future Non-Renewable Supplies

Absent massive shifts in governmental investments and infrastructure in the near future, fossil fuels are likely to constitute the dominant portion of the energy mix over the next 25 years. These energy sources are the least expensive, are supported by a well developed product delivery infrastructure, and are beginning to see technology advancements that mitigate adverse climate impacts. At the same time, the effects of carbon emissions from fossil fuels on global climate change remain a key challenge. (See Climate Change & Greenhouse Gas Emissions).

Future Prospects for Renewable Energy Supplies

Unlike fossil fuels, renewable sources can be used and replenished. The primary forms of renewable energy include:

• Solar
• Wind
• Biomass
• Hydropower
• Geothermal
• Tidal and wave1

The share of renewable energy in the overall global energy portfolio has grown substantially, but remains relatively small in terms of total supply. Many renewable forms of energy supply offer promise for addressing global climate change and mitigating some of the social impacts associated with large scale natural resource projects. At the same time, renewable energy faces significant technical and commercial challenges.2 The most significant challenges to making renewables a mainstream source of energy include committing the investment required to develop technologies, developing the supporting infrastructure, and demonstrating cost competitiveness with fossil fuels. Many forms of renewable energy, such as wind, are beginning to emerge as complements to fossil fuels in the global energy portfolio, but currently lack the scale necessary to displace fossil fuels supply.3

Notwithstanding these challenges, some governmental mandates have begun to pave the way, and renewable energy sources are poised to become a much greater part of the future energy portfolio.

Future Prospects for Nuclear Energy Supplies

Nuclear energy remains a viable source of energy: use is limited in the United States but widespread in countries such as France. The most significant challenge with nuclear energy relates to site permitting as well as the storage and disposal of nuclear waste.4 Furthermore, like other energy resources nuclear plants require several years from initial design to production. The growth of nuclear energy remains largely dependent on securing site approval, finding solutions for storage and disposal of radioactive waste as well as on the availability of budgets for investments in research and development of new advanced nuclear facilities.5

The Future Energy Portfolio

Due to the challenges cited above for each of the energy sources, meeting energy demand will require substantial contributions from all energy types as demonstrated in the following projection.

1. 1 "Renewable Energy Basics," National Renewable Energy Laboratory. http://www.nrel.gov/learning/re_basics.html
2. 2 Kammen, Daniel. "The Rise of Renewable Energy," Scientific American, Volume 295 Number 3, September 2006, p.84.
3. 3 Smith, Rebecca. "The New Math of Alternative Energy," The Wall Street Journal, February 27, 2007. http://yaleglobal.yale.edu/display.article?id=8813
4. 4 "Facing the Hard Truths About Energy: Executive Summary," National Petroleum Council, 2007, p.10. http://www.npchardtruthsreport.org/download.php
5. 5 Ibid, p.10.
6. 6 "The Truth About Oil and Gasoline: An API Primer", API, 8 June 2008, p. 28.