Energy Options: Alternative Sources of Energy
For people who have environmental inclinations, alternative energy is no stranger. Even President-elect Barack Obama has set his sights to pursue alternative sources of energy. But what is alternative energy, really?
The term is used to encompass all sources of energy that mostly are taken from Mother Nature and practically renewable (Well, in a sense); and in almost—if not—all cases the use of the term excludes carbon based fossil fuels and nuclear energy, due to their harmful effects. So we can take as examples hydroelectric, geothermal, solar, and wind energy, among others.
The main benefits or advantages of using these alternative sources rather than the main player in energy—crude oil—is that 1. alternative sources of energy have no harmful end product such as carbon dioxide emissions (which make alternative sources a very attractive option for environmental concerns), and 2. more often than not, these sources are way cheaper than the popular counterpart. Such advantages make searching for alternative sources of energy a prime goal for the international endeavor to combat global warming and climate change, and in the minor sense, gives regular citizens other options aside from suffering blow after blow of oil price increases.
Efforts in the discovery and development of these energy sources are crucial to what sort of future our planet will see. If you think today we’re already in the deep end, if no moves towards alternative energy are made, then there would be no word or idiom to describe what awaits our descendants.
