Energy Issues
Suggest a new IssueCreate an account or sign in to track completed items, rate topics, suggest new foundations, issues, or case studies, and provide feedback on existing topics.
Conservation
Use less energy: combine trips and riders, reduce unnecessary consumption, and moderate heating and cooling before asking how to produce more.
Energy supply and use
Energy sources, electricity, grids, storage, reliability, cost, and environmental effects.
Renewable energy
Solar, wind, hydroelectric, geothermal, wood, and other biomass energy: output, costs, land and materials, environmental effects, storage, and backup.
Nuclear power
Existing and new nuclear plants: reliable supply, construction time, costs, safety, fuel, and radioactive waste.
Home heating and cooling: electricity versus gas
Compare gas furnaces, electric heat, heat pumps, and air conditioning: local energy prices, climate, efficiency, installation, refrigerants, and lifetime costs.
Electric vehicles and charging
Home and public charging, driving needs, batteries, electricity supply, purchase and operating costs, and alternatives to gasoline.
Batteries and energy storage
Storing energy for later use: batteries, pumped storage, duration, losses, materials, costs, safety, and end-of-life handling.
The electric grid, outages, and backup
Transmission, distribution, reliability, outages, generators, home batteries, essential loads, permits, and who pays for the network.
Energy security and imports
Dependence on imported fuels and equipment, supply disruptions, domestic production, reserves, and the trade-offs of self-sufficiency.
Data centers and energy demand
Growing electricity demand from data centers and AI: power supply, grid capacity, cooling water, reliability, and costs for other customers.
Related category: Environment.