Renewable Energy Sources Comparing How Effective They Are...

renewable energy sources comparing how effective they are at producing energy in the UK, taking climate and geographical location into account. I will also be discussing some environmental and political factors behind the need for renewable energy technology such as climate change and Kyoto protocol and focusing on two specific forms of energy production, solar panels and wind turbines also discussing the difference between direct and indirect energy collection. Energy use in the UK is at its highest in history in the years 1990 to 2001. It rose by 11% Nearly all this power is made available by the burning of fossil fuels. The fossil fuels that exist in the earth are formed by compression of plants and animals remains by over millions of†¦show more content†¦These are called greenhouse emissions which are thought to cause the climate to become warmer. Construction and manufacture of buildings and their components account for two thirds of the carbon dioxide released into the atmosphere, affecting its composition by changing the natural cycle of the earth, polluting it and causing global warming. This in turn could cause sea levels to rise by up to 0.5 metres by the end of the century. Left: for nearly half a million years atmospheric concentrations of CO2 have remained in the 200 to 300 parts per million but in 2001 they exceeded this range to 370 ppm the IPCC suggest they could be as high as 700 ppm by the end of the twenty-first century. (IPCC DATA) The threat of global climate change caused by CO2 from fossil fuel combustion is one of the main reasons why there is a growing consensus on the need to reduce these by 60%-80% by the end of the twenty-first century and ultimately a switch to low or zero carbon energy sources such as renewable ones. Buildings account for 40% of all energy used in the EU so European and UK governments have developed policies that aim to tackle energy usage in buildings and construction by a number of targets, grants and incentives that aim to increase the amount of renewable energy we use in our homes and reduce emissions. Renewable energy can be defined as ‘energy obtained from the continuous or repetitive currents of energy recurring in the natural environment’ there