Environmental and Energy Management

EM6763

Lecture # 06

Course Teacher: Dr. Ghulam Asghar

The Modern Energy Matrix:
An Overview
 Introduction of Energy Matrix
 An energy matrix contains the various elements that are required in
order to evaluate and utilize an energy source.

 In the early history, for example, a primary source of energy was

wood. To utilize the energy contained in this source, humans would
start a campfire and thereby utilize the energy in wood to produce
heat and light.

 In today’s world there are numerous sources of energy and a fairly

complex infrastructure that is required to utilize that energy.

 In general terms, there are four areas that are integral to being able to
utilize an energy source.

 These include the resources, production, transportation/transmission,

and utilization aspects that are part of an energy matrix.
 Introduction of Energy Matrix
 The development of energy management plans typically requires fairly
detailed analyses of these four primary areas, which include:
1. The energy resources
2. The production steps and systems to extract energy from the resource
3. The delivery of the energy to the end user by transport or transmission
4. The utilization of the energy at the point of consumption
 A cost-benefit analysis should be performed to address all the benefits and
consequences of each option available to determine the best management
practice for each area.
 Historically, energy management practices evolved from a non-economically
driven world to one that is dominated and highly driven by economics.
Neither of these approaches seriously considered long-term aspects.
 Resources were plentiful in the past and, the focus on profits has influenced
decisions in a major way.
 Energy System Components
 There are four major components of current energy system:
1. Resources
2. Production
3. Transportation/Transmission
4. Utilization
 Resources:
 To manage resources one must know about the energy resources that are
available and their local distribution.
 The quantity and quality of each energy resource must be assessed as accurately
as possible.
 Also, past and present practices concerning to those resources must be defined.
 For example, the oil reserves in the U. S. have been estimated and are
continuously updated to account for expended resources and additional
discovery as well as refined extraction methods to allow more recovery of
formerly depleted areas.
 Energy System Components
 Resources:
 The location of the resource will have an impact on both the economics for
recovery and when that recovery occurs, since the economics must account for
inflation/deflation and product demand.
 Other factors beyond economics are critical to developing a complete
assessment of the value of the resource as well as the consequences of its
recovery and use. All of these aspects need to be part of the cost/benefit
analysis.
 One of the primary difficulties in performing a cost/benefit analysis is that the
price of any commodity (especially oil) can have significant price swings that can
influence which course of action is most appropriate at a given point in time and
space. Here are some points to consider:
1. How important is controlling one’s own energy resources?
2. Which ones need to be controlled?
3. What is the backup plan if foreign reserves are not available?
 Energy System Components
 Resources:
 Here are some points to consider:
4. What level of reserve can be considered adequate?
5. The government does not control the inventory of resources in most cases.
6. Where resources are on government land, access to those resources will
take time and have costs.
 The consequences of recovering an energy resource also need to be assessed in
an energy management plan.
 Under what conditions and to what beneficial use will lands containing resources
be restored or modified to accommodate natural or engineered habitats?
 The economics and the time frames for retrieval need to be incorporated.
 The demand for energy is re-engineering the planet. Therefore, the potential
consequences of meeting energy demand must be evaluated for all elements of
energy management in the future.
 Energy System Components
 Production:
 The production of energy from an energy resource involves time.
 Typically, the most direct utilization of the resource with the least amount
of processing steps will minimize entropic processes giving the largest
return for the least amount of effort.
 The simplest form would be to take a fallen tree and start a fire to heat
water.
 However, oftentimes one cannot utilize the energy resource directly and
substantial processing is required before a useful energy form is achieved.
 A simple example is uranium.
 Ore containing uranium is useless when it comes to producing electricity
unless substantial processing is done under exacting conditions to allow
the energy stored in uranium to be released as heat/steam that in turn
drives a turbine that is connected to a generator to produce electricity.
 Energy System Components
 Production:
 Therefore, selecting the set of options that provides the maximum benefit
with the least loss to entropic sinks will become the appropriate paradigm
in the future as society attempts to cope with dwindling energy
resources.

 Analyses have to be completed that evaluate all the options available to

determine what is most energy efficient, less expensive, and
environmentally beneficial for each resource.

 These will need to be updated as future generations cope with these

problems unless, as is unlikely, a discovery provides the solution to
abundant, cheap, environmentally benign energy.
 Energy System Components
 Transportation/Transmission:
 In general, water transportation is cheaper than that on land, and land
transportation is cheaper than that in the air. Additional details are provided in
Table 6.1.
 There are five principal transportation modes available for transporting energy in
some form from one location to another:
1. Water

2. Pipeline

3. Railroad

4. Truck

5. Electrical transmission

 At present, the three prime energy-containing materials to be transported are

Coal, Oil, and Natural gas.
 Energy System Components
 Transportation/Transmission:
 Once the energy has been transported, it often must be stored prior to use.
Numerous storage technologies are available. A list of some of the more
common methods is provided in Table 6.2.

 In the early days of the Industrial Revolution,

most industries were built close to the
sources of energy.
 Cities became centers of steel production,
manufacturing, and/or chemical industries.
 As industries grew, the distance between the
source of energy and its point of use grew.
 Usually, the largest users of energy are
power-generating plants, and various
techniques are used to transport the energy
resource.
 Energy System Components
 Utilization:
 With the increase in population, utilization of energy has increased dramatically.
 At the domestic level, one normally thinks of energy utilization in terms of
electricity and heat, while industrial uses encompass not only electricity and heat
but also work (pumps, fans, etc.) and the other various modes of energy that are
required in any process or system.
 One primary area of utilization is in the transportation sector; whereas
transportation is responsible for only one-fourth of U.S. total energy needs, it is
one-half of U.S. oil consumption.
 Following the 1973 oil crisis, the U.S. Congress passed a law in 1975 that
mandated doubling the fuel efficiency of new cars by 1985.
 As a result, the average efficiency of all U.S. cars to improve about 8 percent
between 1975 and 1981.
 Automobile manufacturers have the technical capability today to build cars that
are even more efficient but to mass-produce cars with this efficiency would
require vast capital investments.
 Energy System Components
 Utilization:
 The introduction of hybrid vehicles, flex fuels, and other motor vehicle
innovations will continue to improve the fuel efficiency.
 Increases in the price of gasoline have encouraged two other transportation
modes: ride sharing and public transportation.
 There are many other areas of utilization that one often takes for granted. How
does a jet aircraft lift its tremendous weight off the ground? How can a beam of
light become so intensely hot that it can cut through metal?
 Heat and power are also forms of energy and, in most cases, they result from the
release of chemical energy from fuels.
 Fuels can take the form of gases, solids, or liquids. Fossil fuels release their
stored energy as heat when they combine with oxygen from the air in the
process recognized as burning or combustion.
 In order to quantify the ability of fuels to liberate energy, there must be some
way to measure it. A form of energy that one has been able to quantify is work—
the movement of a mass by a force for a specified distance.
 Energy System Components
 Utilization:
 One of the ways used to quantify the work of early engines was to compare
them to the rate at which a horse could move weight (thus, “horsepower”).
This is still a common way to rate engines for automobiles.
 Another basic form of energy is heat, which is often measured in joules.
 In United States, a term quad is also used, which is 1015 Btu.
 An average useful work output of labor for an 8-hour day is 0.05 horsepower.
 Thus, a laborer working strenuously for 8 hours produces only 0.4
horsepower-hour, or 1000 Btu, or 0.3 kilowatt-hours (kWh).
 Man’s capabilities of energy utilization can therefore be expanded
enormously by substituting other sources of energy to do the work.
 With only 0.3 kWh per day, a man can scarcely compete with any machine.
Thus, based on the total energy resources being converted to useful work on
behalf of man, energy conversion systems greatly multiply man’s capabilities.
 Energy Matrix Overview
 The components of energy matrix are critical in an energy demand
and supply train.

 Now, the cost/benefits analyses of each component (relevant

activities) and their impacts on energy, the economy, and the
environment will be evaluated.

 Finally, an evaluation matrix will be proposed that will allow users

to assess the various impacted elements of the matrix using a
uniform basis.

 The impacts of each activity from the point of identifying potential

energy resources through the final end user and residential and
restoration issues are compared on a net unit basis common to all
energy supply components.
Energy Matrix Overview

EEE = Electrical and Electronic

Equipments
 Energy Matrix Overview
 Figure 6.1 provides an illustration of the components involved in currently
taking an energy resource and converting it into a specific energy form to
meet customer demands.
 The reserves or sources of energy are listed along the left column for five
forms of energy containing materials or sources.
 The first step is typically to research how a specific source of energy can
be used to satisfy specific demands.
 The impacts on energy economics and the environment begin to
accumulate as soon as the first thought of using a resource occurs.
 For example, with nuclear ore, individuals need training to perform basic
research.
 That basic research has impacts, including impacts from all support
activities.
 Creating infrastructure has impacts. Support activities have second-order
impacts, and so on.
 Energy Matrix Overview
 Once a system to process nuclear ore was designed, there were pilot scale
projects to determine the viability of the design and proof of concept.
 On the exploration side, activities are necessary to research and explore
the location of nuclear ore reserves.
 Assessments are made to determine the various options on resource
extraction and transportation to refining facilities. Activities for mining
nuclear ore have primary and secondary impacts.
 There are number of considerations and a cost/benefit analysis of each is
required to begin the process of assessing the true costs and benefits of a
specific resource.
 Mining, for example, in northern Canada poses a significantly different set
of constraints compared to mining in Mexico.
 Project- and site-specific requirements can be determining factors in
whether a specific site is viable using current technology.
 Energy Matrix Overview
 Oftentimes, reserves remain untouched until technological advances are
made to allow projects to succeed.

 The conversion of the energy source or reserve to a viable product is

shown as the next step in the energy supply chain.

 Conversion is the transformation of the potential energy stored in a

reserve into an intermediate or usable form of energy.

 Each energy source can be processed to produce various forms to meet

specific demands.

 For example, a nuclear fuel rod (a long, slender, zirconium metal tube
containing pellets of fissionable material, which provide fuel for nuclear
reactors) can be used in a power plant to produce heat that can be
converted to electrical energy.

 Otherwise, the nuclear fuel rod has limited applicability elsewhere.

 Energy Matrix Overview
 However, the electrical energy generated by a nuclear fuel rod can be
used for a variety of purposes.

 The conversion of the energy stored in a nuclear fuel rod requires

infrastructure such as a nuclear power plant.

 That infrastructure has a variety of impacts on energy, economic, and

environmental factors.

 There are also the secondary and other higher order impacts of the
infrastructure.

 In the nuclear power example, facilities are technologically complex,

requiring substantial safeguards and support facilities, and therefore the
extent of the impacts is very large when compared to simple conversion
processes as in the early case of energy use by converting wood via fire to
produce heat and light.
 Energy Matrix Overview
 The next step in the energy supply chain is the distribution of the energy
that has been transformed by transportation or transmission systems.

 Extending the example for nuclear ore, new construction of transmission

lines to carry the electrical power produced by the reactors will be
required.

 This can be integrated into a traditional grid where feasible; however,

major expenditures are usually required to handle the large amounts of
energy produced by these plants.

 Specifically designed high-voltage grids that distribute power over broad

areas are commonly used to reduce the line losses associated with
transmitting electrical energy as alternating current from the plant to the
end user.

 The next step in the energy supply chain is the use of the electrical energy
produced by a nuclear power plant.
 Energy Matrix Overview
 This can be as simple as lighting for residential use or recharging an
electric vehicle or as complex as operations at a chemical company where
the electricity is used to monitor and control chemical reactions that are
creating highly specialized materials used throughout society.

 Achieving these breakthroughs has been in large measure associated with

the availability of energy in a variety of forms and qualities.

 The final component of the energy supply chain is the restoration of

natural systems that have been altered by the earlier components, and
addressing residuals that eventually will occur once the systems are
replaced or become obsolete.

 Again, relative to a nuclear reactor, the tasks for decommissioning a

reactor are extensive—let alone the cost of dealing with spent fuel rods
that might include storage in repositories that require a millennium of
operation, maintenance, and repair cost.
 Energy Matrix Overview
 How should all of these components be addressed to provide an overall
evaluation of an energy supply system?
 Figure 6.2 (on next slide) provides a schematic that can be used in
evaluating the cost/benefit of energy, economic, and environmental
impacts.
 The upper portion of the diagram provides the progression of steps
required to extract energy from a potential source to the end use,
including any residuals or restoration activities.
 The lower portion of the figure illustrates the accommodation of energy
losses, economic costs, and environmental impacts.
 To allow a uniform assessment of each of these, at times, a structure can
be devised to compartmentalize each impact into a unit net factor.
 These can be defined as net Btu costs for energy systems, net monetary
costs for economic impacts, and net environmental impacts to allow
comparisons of different energy systems.
Energy Matrix Overview
 Energy Matrix Overview
 As an extension of this concept, Figure 6.3 (on net slide) provides an
illustration of the energy evaluation matrix. The matrix is composed of all
energy resources, beginning with coal and ending with other resources.
 Under each of the resources are impact elements of that resource, which
are labeled numerically in ascending order for each resource (i.e., C1,
C2,…).
 These can be expanded or modified for each resource category if
necessary.
 The second stage of the matrix is the expansion of each of the resource
categories into sub-categories or sub-elements that equate to the various
types of resources available in each broad category.
 For example, coal resources can be divided into ways of accessing a coal
resource, such as open-pit mining, underground mining, in-place
gasification, or other forms.
Energy Matrix Overview
 Energy Matrix Overview
 Coal can furthermore be divided into different forms of coal—anthracite
bituminous, sub-bituminous, and lignite.
 These extensions of the matrix are not shown in Figure 6.3, for simplicity
purposes. The resource sub-elements of the matrix are further
categorized to include the energy, economic, and environmental impacts
that are illustrated in Figure 6.3.
 Finally, the matrix also includes an element for evaluating the individual
components in the energy supply chain.
 The resource sub-element evaluation is described for coal, as an example.
 Matrices, such as the one described above, provide a valuable tool for the
evaluation of complex systems and processes on a uniform basis.
 The reason for needing a uniform basis in evaluating energy systems is
linked to the large biases that are introduced by all promoters of
individual energy sources.
 Energy Matrix Overview
 For example, when a report is issued about the benefits and costs of using
nuclear fuels to produce electricity, it is common that individual biases
will tend to promote the nuclear option over all others.

 When reports critical of the nuclear industry are issued, these also
contain individualized biases from a different perspective.

 Therefore, individuals making decisions on which systems to support may

not be in a position to make an informed decision.
 Best of Luck for
Mid Term Exam
 The mid term exam will be from
Lecture #1 to Lecture #5.

 Assignment #01 is also included in

the mid term exam.
Thank You