The world economy currently burns 19,473 million tons of oil equivalent, of which 80% is in the form of fossil fuels, per year. 1 ton of oil equivalent is 11,630 kWh, or 11.6MWh. So 19,473 million tons of oil equivalent is 225,886,800,000 MWh, or 225,887 TWh. Total annual world electricity […] - ThreadSky

simon-brooke.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy • 14 days ago

The world economy currently burns 19,473 million tons of oil equivalent, of which 80% is in the form of fossil fuels, per year. 1 ton of oil equivalent is 11,630 kWh, or 11.6MWh. So 19,473 million tons of oil equivalent is 225,886,800,000 MWh, or 225,887 TWh.

Total annual world electricity […]

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simon-brooke.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy•14 days ago

"...to replace our current reliance on fossil fuels. That is to say, we need to build six times as much clean capacity as the total capacity we currently have. We're currently planning to build just one point three terawatt hours of new clean capacity per year, meaning it will take roughly 140 […]

drnoble.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy•14 days ago

@simon_brooke I can’t remember the number, but a significant portion of the energy in fossil fuels is wasted in extraction, refining and transportation. Renewables are more efficient, although we do need to add in some losses for the energy storage needed.

simon-brooke.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy•14 days ago

@drnoble aye, the losses with lithium ion are impressively small – under 5%. Hydrogen is horrible, you lose 39%. I don't have numbers for pumped storage.

drnoble.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy•14 days ago

@simon_brooke pumped storage is 80%+ round trip efficiency, depending on rainfall. I think Foyers above Loch Ness generates more than it uses for pumping as it has quite a large catchment

Tallish-Tom.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy•14 days ago

@drnoble @simon_brooke

"By weight, 40% of maritime trade consists either of fossil fuels on their way to be burned or of chemicals derived directly from fossil fuels."

https://qz.com/2113243/forty-percent-of-all-shipping-cargo-consists-of-fossil-fuels

simon-brooke.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy•14 days ago

@Tallish_Tom @drnoble aye, that's another thing that just no longer has to be done at all.

Tallish-Tom.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy•14 days ago

@simon_brooke

Just checking, is that FF to electricity equivalent factored in the primary energy conversion?

https://medium.com/@jan.rosenow/have-we-been-duped-by-the-primary-energy-fallacy-167f53c58961

simon-brooke.mastodon.scot.ap.brid.gy•14 days ago

@Tallish_Tom I just started with aviation fuel, from which the costs of extraction and refining are already excluded; but when I went on to total energy consumed... Well, I'm not sure. My numbers for that come from https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_energy_supply_and_consumption, so are […]

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