A Fundamental Look At Supply Side Energy Reserves For The PlanetNovember 2015 - PDF 0.15MB
By: Richard Perez, Atmospheric Sciences Research Center, University at Albany, Statue University of New York and Marc Perez, MGH-Energy
Publisher: IEA SHC
This is an update of the April 2009 Solar Update article. The objective of the 2009 article was to put in perspective the potential of often-cited nuclear and renewable alternatives to Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emitting fossil energy sources. Its main conclusion was that although a mix of alternatives, including hydropower, biomass/biofuels, geothermal, ocean thermal energy conversion, waves, tides, wind and solar, appeared like a sound approach to bringing about the desired economically and environmentally sustainable energy future (akin to putting future energy eggs in different baskets), a review of their potential clearly showed that the solar resource dwarfed all other renewables (and fossil/nuclear alike) by orders of magnitude. And therefore, the desired economically and environmentally sustainable energy mix of the future should be essentially solar-based.