Renewable Energy, Vol.19, No.1, 285-290, 2000
Exergy based supply side energy management for sustainable energy development
Sustainability is regarded as a major consideration for both urban and rural development. People have been exploiting the natural resources with no consideration to the effects-both short term (environmental) and long term (resource crunch). It is felt that knowledge and technology have not been used optimistically. The urban areas depend to a large extent on commercial energy sources. The rural areas use non-commercial sources like firewood, agricultural wastes. Even this is decreasing over the years, with the Villagers wanting to adopt the ready to use sophisticated technology. The debate now is to identify a suitable via media. The option that fills this gap aptly is the renewable energy source. Though it is often argued that the link between renewable energy and sustainability is only theoretical and academical rather than practical, it must be realised that in the long run renewable energy is the only option that could meet the growing energy needs. An attempt has been made here to analyse the supply side management of energy resources contrary to demand side management which is followed now. The results reveal that exergy destruction is reduced thus increasing the returns and paving the way for sustainable development.