New York Renewable Energy - Report Example

New York Renewable Energy Student’s Name Institution Affiliation Executive Summary The environment is a very important asset to human beings. When it comes to its conservation, it is the responsibility of each and every person to ensure that it is not polluted in any way. We have seen various forms of pollution that have led to the degradation of the environment hence making it difficult for the living of the human beings in the environment. Sources of energy in the world are the major sources of pollution to the environment. They can lead to air pollution, water pollution, and land pollution. There are many sources of energy ranging from the; hydroelectric source of energy, fossil fuels, wind energy and the nuclear source of energy. All the sources of energy have their disadvantage which can be contained while others are beyond the control. The source of energy that is non-renewable are the major contributors of carbon emission to the atmosphere. Emission of carbon usually has a very hazardous impact to the environment. There is a need for us to understand on how this can be reduced. Global warming is a rising problem, and it is becoming more of a problem every day in today’s society. The carbon footprint set by the populations of the world has become a major issue and must be minimized. It is now the obligation of all engineers to think about the environment when designing anything. The world depends on fossil fuels every day, and this must be reduced and ultimately eliminated. This should be replaced with renewable sources of energy to ensure the future generations of the world. This task, however, is a difficult one due to the high power demands of today’s society. In this lab report will seek to understand the importance of renewable energy in ensuring that pollution of the environment is reduced. Different types of renewable types of energy are to be considered to see how they contribute towards a clean environment. The city of New York will be used in determining the progress that renewable energy can make towards reducing emission of carbon to the environment. The report will consider factors geographical analysis, calculations and other environmental considerations regarding renewable energy. The results of the report indicate the factors that need to be taken in ensuring that renewable sources of energy are implemented in the New York City. It outlines the extent to which only renewable sources of energy can be used. However, there must an element if fossil fuel (natural gases) have also been utilized as another source of stable power. Ideally no State in the world can fully depend on renewable energy due to renewable energy is unreliable unlike fossil fuels. New York demands quite high power consumption and therefore it is not realistic that this state will last with renewable energy alone. Bearing in mind that it is one of the largest state in the world where the demand of energy is very high. In the report it is indicated on how renewable source of energy has eliminated or reduced the use of other forms of energy that may be harmful to the environment. The renewable solution completely eliminates the need of nuclear power and reduces coal significantly. Due to this elimination, New York renewable energy has increased significantly. However, other aspects have not been taken into consideration such as: economic factors, environmental impact and interconnection with the grid. Introduction The emissions that result from the fossil fuels and the negative impacts of nuclear energy has resulted to search for alternative sources of energy. Carbon emission has resulted to climate change in the environment. The effects of climate change in today environment is very much the focus of the governments on a global scale. It has become apparent that the current non-renewables resources required are diminishing and thus action must be taken to provide renewable energy. New York City being one of the largest cities in the world is selected with an assumption that the city has energy demand that is typical of the United State in which it resides. Approximations and studies are carried out to estimate on how the energy needs within the city can be satisfied without the use of non-renewable sources of energy. In undertaking the study in this lab it was assumed that New York depends on itself to get energy and also it owns a grid of its own. Economic impacts and influences were not taken into consideration in this study. The focus is only on generating a technically feasible renewable grid solution. A reasonable assessment of the availability of renewable sources needs to be undertaken. This project only consider the monthly availability of a resource based on averages. Background Study Diverse sources of data was used to enable us understand the status of renewable energy in New York. In order to understand and use alternative energy first data regarding the population, base and peak energy consumption, and the generation methods must be obtained for New York. Once this data is gathered a theoretical but realistic approach can be achieved for providing energy in the geographical locations that are found around New York City. The source of information in order to understand the background for New York was obtained from ‘U.S. Energy Information Administration’ (eia) which is issued by the government. Approximately 8.5 million residents reside in New York in 2013, with an annual power consumption of approximately 120 million megawatt-hours. Figure 1 – Energy Consumption, 2013 Figure 2 – Net Electricity, 2015 The above graphs show how much power is produced and consumed by New York State. This puts in perspective on the types of power consumed into minds of the students. These graphs also indicates how New York produced and consumed almost 100% of non-renewable energy’s such as: coal, gases and nuclear. However, there is a plan to reduce the amount of non-renewable sources of energy used within the city so as to reduce the emissions that are released to the environment. The aim has been to reduce the use of nonrenewable energy by half in the year 2030. However, currently there has been a significant reduction on the use of nonrenewable energy. It is estimated that the reduction has reached 40%. And the megawatts of nonrenewable energy has rose by around 26%. Aim The target of the report is to ensure that a suitable and realistic solution towards the reduction of usage nonrenewable energy is provided. Renewable sources of energy must be made to be primary source of power in New York. The report will be proposed a workable plan that will lead to the reduction of the usage nonrenewable energy by a great deal so that we can ensure that emissions of carbon are reduced drastically. Some of the sources of energy that will be considered include solar, wind and hydro technology which will substituted nuclear and coal energy. However, natural gas may be retained since it will be a hard task to eliminate it from being used hence result to a greater impact in energy usage on a great deal. In the report, different targets that will be aimed will be set, and the different sources of energy will be discussed. It will consider only those sources of energy that will be used towards the reduction of emissions in New York. It is going to consider solar energy, wind energy, and hydroelectric power. Results Solar energy Solar plants will be based on the type of solar plant for installation, and that is it kept to a maximum production of electricity and keeps the surface area consumption at a minimum. As part of an initiative to ensure that solar energy is maximized to ensure the increase of the Usage of solar energy in 2014, an initiative that was dubbed as NY-sun initiative which had an aim of installing 3000 megawatts solar Pv by the year 2023 was started,. By the end of the year 2015, already 457 megawatts had already been uundertakenand atleast 493 megawaats were being developed during this period. Also, New York encouraged consumers to instal customer sited solar panels on there roof topss which could reduce amount of energy that would be demanded from the grid and other sources of energy. Due to the diffeerent initiatives that were being undertaken, the state was ranked at number five in termes of solar energ capacity which was an improvement from position eight. In the year 2014, there was rise of the solar energy capacity within New York, thous still it provides a small percentage of the total amount of energy tthat is supplied at New York standing at 1%. In the world NewYork has rose in terms of ranking due to its efforts to increase its solar energy capacity. Long Island Solar Farm with 32-megawatts is the one that is the largest solar energy producer in Newyork whereby other solar installations are small undertakings. The proposed additional capacity of solar energy in New York will contribute a great deal towards the reduction on the dependency on nonrenewal sources of energy. Wind energy Wind energy is a very useful source of renewable energy which the power supply of the wind increases with the third power of momentary wind speed. Wind turbines are designed to generate power from natural sources from wind. Generation will begin to operate at 3 m/s until it reaches the rated power at 12 to 15 m/s. if the turbine reaches speeds of 25 m/s or over the system will active a shutdown procedure. The annual energy yield at this site will increase approximately with the square of the given annual mean wind speed. In order to optimise a larger system the energy yielded and overload avoidance is required and the respective wind speed corresponding adjustment needs to reach optimal angle of the rotor blades thus generating power. The mechanical energy generated by the wind flow on the turbine which is converted into electrical energy. Therefore the wind power plant will be produced by the kinetic energy, which is included in the wind field. The local spatial density of kinetic energy by the square of the instantaneous local wind velocity. The most common source of renewable energy in New York is electricity. The sources have been thoroughly been researched by the relevant institutions to ensure that capacity optimization is reached. This will reduce dependency on nonrenewable sources of energy to a large extent. Most of the New York sources of energy is from wind power. The first wind farm that started production was started in the year 2000. Since then other wind farms have been developed in this state boosting the quantity of electricity that they contribute to the grid. The estimated potential energy that wind in New York can produce is 140,000 megawatts. The concentrations of the potential areas is around Lake Ontario and Lake Erie, the mountain peaks of Adirondack, along the shoreline of Long island, and also some areas along Long Island coast are said to be having a great potential of having high capacity wind energy production farms. With the continued expansion of the wind farms within the state, there will be increased capacity of the energy from wind which is one of the renewable sources of energy. This will result to reduction of the quantity of emissions to the environment. New York also has embarked on the process of ensuring that other sources of renewable energy are used like biomass and biogas resources which is an upgrade is done to make it a hydroelectric power production. A goal of getting 8.5% of renewable energy from small, customer sited facilities was set. This could ensure that sources such as Solar photovoltaic and solar thermal systems, anaerobic digester systems, fuel cells and wind installations are undertaken to ensure there is an increased capacity of the amount of renewal energy within New York. Installation of customer systems that generate up to 200 kilowatts are encouraged. Incentives are given to ensure that customers undertake those systems. Conclusion According to the aim of the report, the lab has indicated that there is a possibility of reducing the quantity of emissions by increasing the capacity of renewable sources of energy. When the capacity of sources of energy such as wind and solar is enhanced, the level of nonrenewable energy will be reduced drastically achieving the mission of obtaining increased quantity of energy from this sources. References New York State Energy Research and Development Authority, 2015. NY-Sun Annual Performance Report. New York State Energy Research and Development Authority, 2015. New York State Renewable Portfolio Standard, Annual Performance Report. U.S. Energy Information Administration, 2014. State Energy Data System, Table C10, Energy Consumption Estimates by End-Use Sector, Ranked by State. U.S. Department of Energy, 2015. Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, WIND Exchange, New York Wind Resource Map and Potential Wind Capacity. Read More