Possible Impacts of Environmental Standards on Electric Power Availability and Costs

In my opinion, the projections of U.S. energy consumption for the end of this century cited by Joel Darmstadter ¹ overstate the likely rate of growth. The projections indicate 190,014 trillion British thermal units (Btu) of total energy input for the year 2000, net electric energy generation of 10,802 billion kilowatt-hours (kwh), and installed generating capacity of 2,228,400 megawatts (mw). I believe the requirements are likely to be 20–25 percent less—152,000 trillion Btu of total energy input, 8,640 billion kwh of electric generation, and 1,780,000 mw of electrical generating capacity. Even so, these are formidable estimates in view of the figures for 1970 of 68,000 trillion Btu of total energy input, 1,529 billion kwh generated, and 340,000 mw of installed generating capacity.