ABSTRACT
The main cause of environmental problems deriving from energy use, identified in Chapter 6, is the use of fossil fuels in power production, in the transportation, industry and building sectors. Hydropower production and nuclear energy also pose some special problems, as does biomass. The use of fuelwood in developing countries is a source of local pollution and deforestation, and accounts for a considerable parcel of the greenhouse gas emissions. The most obvious way of solving these problems is to totally or partially remove their causes. This is a very difficult task, yet not impossible. In the energy area, there are three possible ways of solving problems:
energy efficiency (or energy conservation), to obtain an equivalent well-being with less natural resources;
renewable energies, which save fossil fuels from exhaustion; and
new technological advances, which manage to achieve commercial scale use.
