The article explores the possible replacements of the ever diminishing supplies of fossil fuels. It views the prospects of using fossil fuels in the future as reducing every day given that they are created over geological time. It explores the probable sources of energy to replace the fossil fuels and recommends a number of alternatives that include wind power, solar, geothermal, nuclear, hydropower, and biomass. From the findings, the article strongly believes that solar power would be the best alternative for fossil fuels, but there is a need to reduce the costs of solar PV.
Sims, R. E., Rogner, H.-H., & Gregory, K. (2003). Carbon emission …show more content…
(2014). Avoiding fossil fuel costs with wind energy . Bruxelles: European Wind Energy Association.
The report establishes through its findings that fossil fuels could be replaced with wind energy through the establishment of a sound regulatory framework. Although the report recommends other renewable energy, it still recommends wind power due to the savings that arise from the use of wind energy and from the elimination of fossil fuels import. The wind energy sounds a good alternative considering the costs savings and the saving on environmental pollution. However, it does not consider other factors such as the low wind intensity and reliability.
According to IWEA, the prices of fossil fuels are always changing and are expected to increase in the near future. This is to mean that people will have to look for alternative sources of energy to cushion themselves from the increasing prices. The report observes that although the wind power may use fuel to produce power, the amount used is insignificant to cause challenges from the changes in fuel prices. As a way to reduce dependency on domestic and imported fuels, nations could embrace wind energy that has no greenhouse gas emissions and no import bill (EWEA, …show more content…
Renewable energy sources such as water, the wind, biofuel, and solar have little or no carbon emissions and, therefore, scores highly well in the replacement of fossil fuels. However, the cost of eliminating these emissions through renewable energy is high for all the alternatives.
However, when considering the potential for the reduction of the emissions, wind power holds the best potential for reducing the emissions followed by biofuels and solar energy scoring the lowest on the list. Even with the existing differences in the cost of reducing emission from the fossil fuels, it is possible to control the cost and amount of carbon emissions under certain conditions.
With the available alternative sources of energy such as the wind, solar, biomass, and nuclear energy for fossil fuels, the article outlines that renewable energy remains sidelined due to not only the costs and availability but also due to the low net energy ratio and capital intensity (Timmons, 2015). Even with these problems, renewable energy alternatives have the ability to replace fossil fuels if the proper mechanisms are