Annals of the University of Oradea: Economic Science (Jul 2017)
IS IT POSSIBLE FOR WESTERN SOCIETY TO RUN ONLY ON RENEWABLE ENERGY? – THE CASE OF ICELAND
Abstract
Iceland is rich of energy sources, mainly hydropower, geothermal energy and wind. The energy production in 2016 was 13,472 GWh in hydropower and 41,400 GWh in geothermal energy. The wind energy is barely used but that could change in next decades. Realistic maximum potential of electricity production is 30,000 GWh from hydropower and 20,000 GWh from geothermal energy but the potential in wind is not known. Lot of oil is used in Iceland and it is important to decrease consumption of oil and try to revert to renewable energy as much as possible. When analysed in categories it comes out that airplanes are the biggest users of oil, 10,000 kWh/capita per year. In second place are ships using 6,000 kWh/capita of oil and in third place is the family car using 5,700 kWh/capita. Other users of oil are heavy cars, heavy machines and agricultural machinery. The possibilities of reverting to renewables in these categories is very different. It is easy in the case of family cars and that change is ongoing in Iceland. It is difficult in the cases of ships, heavy cars, heavy machines and agricultural machinery. In these categories the change to renewable energy is heavily dependent on production of electric equipment of this kind or production of fat for biodiesel, mainly with oil plants like rapeseed. Regarding airplanes use of renewable energy is difficult and totally impossible these years. So the answer is no, it is not possible for western society like Iceland to run only on renewable energy. Not at this point in time but there are technical solutions so in the future it should be possible. Because of the long distance between Iceland and the rest of Europe it has not been possible to use the resources of the country for export of electricity. It is now technically possible using submarine power cable. The longest cable in the world of this kind is the 580 km long NorNed cable. Such cable between Iceland and Scotland would have to be over 1,000 km. The energy through cable from Iceland could be sufficient for about 600,000 people in Britain. Because of the unused wind source in Iceland it is likely that more cables would be set up if the fists would be of success
