The Global Population and Alternative Source of Energy - Essay Example

? Sustainability Issues of Using Oil and Petroleum Products Sustainability Issues of Using Oil and Petroleum Products Mankind has heavily relied on the natural resource endowment for their daily survival and sustenance. These natural resources and man-made resources have played a critical role in supporting the rapidly growing human population. However, following the rising population pressures on the available resources, these resources are the brink of depletion and exhaustion are they are being consumed by at prodigious rate by the mankind. Some of the natural resources that are highly threatened include trees, wildlife, fertile soil, and fossil fuels. Although some of these resources such as trees, wildlife, and soil fertility can possibly be restore through improved conservation measures, some of the resources that are provided by nature are irreversible and they consumption reduces their availability (Lee, & Ofori-boateng, 2013). For instance, oil and fossil resources are non-renewable natural resources that get depleted with time. Even the recycling of other minerals and resources in the surrounding is likely to suffer from lack of adequate energy for the recycling process. For this reason, it is important to note that the sustainability of other resource and natural endowment heavily depend on the sustainability and the existence of energy that is extracted from the fossil deposits. Although the energy conservation organizations are encouraging a shift in the energy sector with renewable energy sources being preferred as the replacement of the traditional non-renewable energy sources such as oil and petroleum products, this proposed shifting would only be possible with sustainability of fossil deposits (Sullivan, 2009). The overreliance on fossil and particularly oil product as the primary source of energy and fuel has adversely affected the capacity of these resources and thus raising questions about their ability to sustain the faster growing global population over the next decade. Despite the economic value and contribution to the economic growth and development in general, oil and petroleum resources are likely to be fully exhausted with the ores running dry. It is therefore important for cheaper and sustainable alternative be explored to relieve oil and petroleum resources from this over-exploitation. The sustainability of the fast growing human population is determined the adequate food production, a factor that also need energy resources to be realized. Unlike in the last century when there was production boom in the agricultural sector given that the dumped vast petroleum resources to support agricultural productivity (such as petroleum driven pesticides and chemicals), today, there is global hunger and starvation (Lee, & Ofori-boateng, 2013). The produces from these farms are then channeled and transported to other destinations for feed the hungry through the use of fossil fuel powered engines such as trains, ships, trucks, and planes. This implies that there is relationship between the sustainability of the oil production and food products that are the primary the source of sustainability for the human general in the coming days. The excessive use of these resource have posed more problem to the world; including global warming that further threaten the exploitation of oil and petroleum products (Vincenzo & Nicola, 2010). Therefore, the sustainability of the oil products depends on how effective these resources are exploited and run. Given the importance of these oil and petroleum products to the economy, emphasis should be given to these non-renewable products. Issues of Relying on Oil Products Although oil and petroleum products account for over 80% of the global energy sources, the future of these energy products raises a lot of questions (Sullivan, 2009). The use of these products is associated with a number of environmental sustainability issues such as pollution. Pollution is the major concern on the consumption of these valuable products that have a number of uses and support many sectors. Oil and petroleum products have economic value that diminishes with the rising marginal productivity and therefore should be cautiously utilized (Yergin, 2008). The consumption of petroleum products have posed environmental problem that have led do a significant drop in the quality of life of the entire human generation and other living creatures. The main types of pollution that arises from intensive used of oil products include air, water, and land. The major concern with oil as the major source of energy is the fact that it reduces the marginal social benefit to the society at large. Secondly, over utilization of oil and petroleum products lead to environmental degradation which in turn affects the living standards (Aslaug, & Oluf, 2008). The excessive oil consumption is mainly attributed to the leading global warming that has further impacted on the sustainability of other natural resources within the universe. This therefore calls for strategies of reducing the degree of reliance on oil and thereby possibly minimizing the negative externalities associated with oil and petroleum products (Sullivan, 2009). Although thinking about an oil free world is unrealistic, it is possible to seek ways of reducing these threats. This starts with addressing industrial pollution since it is this sector that account for more than half of the total pollution to both air and water. Strategic Developments in Oil Sustainability The strategic development towards attaining a sustainable use of oil products is the adoption of particular approach that addresses this case. The changing fuel demands back-to-basics approach and the climatic actions approach are some of the recent development towards achieving sustainable use of the petroleum products (Yergin, 2008). The rising prices has contributed highly to the costs and decreased the value added of all products. The products that have suffered from the increased costs of production due to rising oil prices include the products that are not only necessities, but also are also the petroleum itself and petroleum based products. Considering the annual costs of the petroleum products, refining alone accounts for more than $8 billion of the energy purchases in the United States, considering United States as one of the largest energy consuming economies in the globe (Yergin, 2008). The changing demand fuels back-to-basics approach recognizes the increased air quality and climatic changes demands and advocates for the use of technology, particularly the new developments in the automotive developments technology as well as the biotechnology, to tackle the new challenges of the refineries (Vincenzo & Nicola, 2010). One of the methods that this approach proposes in achieving sustainability in use of the petroleum products is the production of lighter petroleum products and the low sulphur automotive fuels that needs less amount of energy to convert. In the development, the demand for lighter product mix considering the new technologies has become the ultimatum of the recent oil productions and refineries (Sullivan, 2009). Although this approach is pulling a lot of pressure from the environment, safety, and quality standards, production of lighter petroleum products would highly enable sustainable use of oil and petroleum products in the future. Moreover, the high gas emissions from the greenhouse in the petroleum life cycle finalize with the final consumer making the energy use to become a major source of the environmental emissions in the refineries (Yergin, 2008). Considering the above risks, the basic approach of energy efficiency improvements can be a relatively low-cost driven means for the refineries to reduce the petroleum gas emissions and cutting down the operating costs afterwards. Between 2002 and 2012, the American Petroleum Institute (API) came up with the outlines of the climatic action challenges and the industrial commitments to improving efficiency of energy use by 10 percent (Vincenzo & Nicola, 2010). Notably, the energy industry’s background data imply that most petroleum refineries are best suited to improve the efficiency of energy by close to 20 percent thereby enhancing sustainability in this sector. More importantly, these data further suggest that through economic improvement of energy efficiency, millions of dollars can be saved and the high environmental benefits and oil use sustainability can be attained (Yergin, 2008). Improving energy efficiency through the adoption of new production technologies and sound management practices is among the best sustainability approaches that can help achieve the global goal of sustainable energy use (Vincenzo & Nicola, 2010). For instance, American refineries like Marathon Oil Corporation and Armstrong are collaborating in order to identify and capture the key aspects of saving energy and reducing emissions of the harmful gases like carbon dioxide as well as nitrogen oxide (Sullivan, 2009). By putting in place new energy efficient equipment and upgrades of the existing equipments, the two refineries aim to produce high-energy efficient petroleum products that would contribute to the sustainability of the oil and petroleum products in the end. Conclusion In conclusion, with the global population hitting the 8 billion mark the need for sustainable resources and energy important and should be focused. Notably oil resources are non-renewable and they get depleted day-by-day, hence the need to seek alternative source of energy that is more sustainable having less negative implications to the environment. In particular, the environmental cleaning cost of using oil and petroleum products is more costly and unaffordable to the users. For this reason, most oil energy consumers fail to be socially responsible for their actions. To comprehensively solve the challenge related to oil and petroleum energy sources, mainly pollution, alternative energy sources should be used. In particular, non-pollutant and least pollutant energy alternative such as electrical, nuclear, wind, and solar energy sources should be preferred at the expense of oil or petroleum. This would a significant towards reducing the demand pressure on petroleum products and also leading to decline in the environmental related negative implications of oil consumption. Such a demand shift would reduce the pressure on the exploitation of these valuable resources. In addition, environmental cleaning and social responsibility would be important in reducing cleaning the negative external effects oil these petroleum products. References Aslaug, M., & Oluf, L. (2008). Arctic Oil and Gas: Sustainability at Risk? Routledge. Lee, Keat Teong, & Ofori-boateng, Cynthia. (2013). Sustainability of Biofuel Production from Oil Palm Biomass. Springer Verl Sullivan, J. (2009). "'Greenwashing' Gets His Goat - Environmental Activist Coined Famous Term." Recordonline.com - Times Herald-Record - Recordonline.com. Vincenzo, B. & Nicola, A.. (2010). Energy for a Sustainable World: From the Oil Age to a Sun-Powered Future. John Wiley & Sons. Yergin, D. (2008). The Prize: The Epic Quest for Oil, Money and Power. New York: Free. Read More