Published: January 19, 2008 07:44 pm         

America has a love affair with consuming energy

Energy and wasteful cars

It is amazing to learn how much energy our country consumes each year as well as the energy breakdown between the different segments of our economy.

The latest complete figures are from the year 2006. The U.S. uses 100 quadrillion BTUs of energy each year. (A British Thermal Unit is the heat energy needed to raise 1 pound of water by 1 degree Fahrenheit; 1 BTU is equivalent to 0.25 kilocalories or diet calories.) By economic sectors, U.S. energy breakdown is: Industry (32.4 percent), transportation (28.4 percent), residential/homes (21 percent) and commercial (18 percent) .

The U.S. energy use per person per year is about 330 million BTU. In kilowatt hours, this energy per person per year is 96,600 kilowatt hours. (If you paid at the rate charged by electric companies (average is about 10 cents per kilowatt hour), you would pay nearly $10,000 for your energy share every year!) In terms of power, each U.S. individual accounts for about 11,000 watts continuously throughout the year. Of course, our share includes the energy expended by industry, transportation, homes and businesses.

What part of this 330 million BTU is under our control? Suppose you drive for an hour a vehicle (car, truck) that gets 25 miles per gallon at a speed of 50 miles per hour. Each gallon of gas when burned releases the energy of 36 kilowatt hours. So during that hour, your car engine consumes 72 kilowatt hours, so the power of the vehicle is 72 kilowatts or 72,000 watts!

This is nearly 6.5 times your average power through the year. If you drive a heavier car which may get only half as many miles per gallon, then you would need twice as much gasoline per hour and your energy or power would be twice as much or 144,000 watts. This is equivalent to the average electrical power of 100 homes!

It gets even more depressing. An energy analysis of cars shows that much of the energy is discarded as waste heat out the tailpipe or radiator. Then more energy is consumed by friction, running the different pumps, the alternator, air conditioner/heater, lights and radio/CD player. This leaves with less than 10 percent of the energy to actually move the car forward!

The latest figures for petroleum reveal that 73 percent of petroleum used by American vehicles is imported. America has 2 percent of the world’s conventional oil reserves and we pump out of our wells 8 percent of the world’s oil each year, so we are drawing down our own oil reserves four times as fast as the global average. Regular grade gasoline is now selling at over $3 a gallon. Since 2001, the price of gasoline has doubled while the price of a barrel of crude petroleum has nearly quadrupled.

How has America responded to the rising price of petroleum? It must be noted that our economy relies heavily on trucks; these trucks move supplies and merchandise to stores. But if you note the newer personal vehicles on the roads and in parking lots, they are mostly SUVs and pickup trucks.

Watch the new car ads on television or read the reviews of new vehicles in magazines and newspapers; you will mainly see powerful, sporty cars and rugged vehicles to go off road and explore nature’s wildernesses. The purchase of these vehicles is driven by advertising, style and the need to project a certain self image by driving a powerful vehicle.

Overseas, small cars are in the majority as people there view driving a car as a privilege not a right. Their high gasoline taxes finance excellent public transportation (primarily trains) that are far more energy efficient than a car. (A train expends 1/10 as much energy per passenger mile as a car.)

Is the feeling that I can drive anywhere I want at any time with my vehicle, a national asset or a national folly?

I am not proposing high gasoline taxes, but to caution American consumers to think very carefully at their next car purchase. The big, heavy car is better parked in front of your house to win your neighbors’ admiration; drive a fuel efficient vehicle and avoid pain at the gas pumps.

Full moon and shows

Tomorrow and Tuesday evening the moon is full, rising about the time of sunset and hanging in the sky all through the night. On Thursday evening, the moon will appear near the planet Saturn in the late evening sky.

The Frostburg State Planetarium in January features “Heavenly Music,” spotlighting the simultaneous rise of great classical music and key telescopic discoveries from the 1600’s into the 1800’s. There will also be an informal tour of the current evening sky. Our Celestial Highlights for 2008 is available free to our planetarium visitors.

The Planetarium is in Tawes 302, just off the front lobby (faces Compton Science Center). Following a brief intermission, there will be tours of the Compton Exploratorium where the Cavallaro Mammal Collection is on display.

To get a free Planetarium/Exploratorium bookmark that features a small map of the FSU campus and where to park, call (301) 687-7799 and leave your name and mailing address.

Bob Doyle invites comments or questions from readers; email him at rdoyle@frostburg.edu .