Energy

History

• Fire was the first form of energy
• Early forms of energy were those used to hunt animals, harvest edible plants, and process and transport food, energy came from eating food
• Energy Progression: burning coal, heating for cooking, refining petroleum as fuels for lamps, wheels to harness water, windmills, intense coal mining, natural gas well, electromagnetism, electric generator and motor, first oil well drilled in Pennsylvania (1850s), solar energy generator, alternating current system, geothermal energy, the world’s largest petroleum deposit in Saudi Arabia, first nuclear power plants
• Invention of electricity, earliest 20^th century, favored method for transmitting energy
•  Trends: dependency on foreign oil, Three Mile Island (1979), evidence that fossil fuel is contributing to global climate change, fear of depletion of nonrenewable resources (since the 1860s) is still relevant

Trajectory

•  Further developing existing energy sources
•   Economic disincentive for not using sustainable energy sources/methods/processes
•  Goals from Mayor Nutter (2010): Lower overall city energy consumption, generate 20% from alternative energy sources, reduce vehicle miles traveled, divert 70% of solid waste from landfill  http://www.phila.gov/green/greenworks/PDFs/GreenworksPlan002.pdf

Goldilocks Scale

• Neighborhood – widespread, unified collaboration in order to manage energy