Finding sources for clean and affordable energy has been a focus of environmentalist organizations since the detriment of nonrenewable energy became clear in 1938. The search for renewable energy sources has continued to produce a multitude of options like sunlight and solar energy, wind, hydropower, and geothermal heat. Regardless of the discoveries of their possibilities, their implementation has been slow to take hold.
UN SDG Goal #7 is about ensuring access to clean and renewable energy, which is crucial to the healthy development of agriculture, business, education, healthcare, and transportation. The lack of access to clean resources and energy prevents economic growth and human development, as well as damages the health of our global ecosystems. According to the United Nations latest data, the world continues to advance towards targets of renewable energy by 2030, but rising energy, shipping, and commodity prices have increased the total expense of renewable energy sources and their development.
Nonrenewable energy production and use releases waste into bodies of Water through a multitude of channels. Run-off, direct spills, and air-polluted rain all contribute to the continued contamination of global water resources, and have affected the health of ecosystems, wildlife, and people who rely on these water sources. The failure to protect bodies of water from the pollution by nonrenewable energy sources like fossil fuels has resulted in a lack of accessibility to clean Water, and shortened food supplies by killing wildlife through absorption of toxic waste.
Water has played a crucial role in renewable energy sources, proving that through movement and force, it can power hydropower plants through hydroenergy. Water& recognizes the crucial role Water plays in both the result of environmental abuse and regeneration of clean energy and resources. Hydropower is the most widely used type of renewable energy, and represents about 17% of the total electricity production globally. Without the use of hydropower, there would be significantly less progress in the dire need for renewable energy sources in our modern world. Two thirds of the economically feasible potential of hydroenergy has yet to be established and developed, and these untapped resources are mainly located in Latin America, Central Africa, and India. In these untapped regions where hydroenergy has yet to be implemented, nonrenewable energy sources continue to contribute to the pollution of our earth and Watershed systems.
Water& has developed understandings of how crucial Water’s role in healing and regeneration of global energy sources is. While the world continues to burn carbon gasses and fossil fuels, Water is being polluted and damaged irreversibly, all while its power and potential to heal our planet from nonrenewable energy falls short. Water& knows the weight of this goal of finding affordable and clean energy sources for all, and knows the opportunity and healing investing in our natural Water resources could bring. Water& strongly supports the use of renewable energy, the use of hydropower, and the investment into the use of renewable energy. Achieving energy and climate goals will require mobilization of both private and public capital in developing countries and changes in continued policy support.
Water& knows how crucial Water is to developing more renewable energy options and systems, and we employ the public to continue the fight for widespread implementation of renewable energy globally, as it will protect our environment, our health, and our watershed systems.
Sources
“Climate Change Evidence: How Do We Know?” NASA, NASA, 21 Dec. 2022, https://climate.nasa.gov/evidence/#:~:text=In%201896%2C%20a%20seminal%20paper,Earth's%20atmosphere%20to%20global%20warming.
“Energy - United Nations Sustainable Development.” United Nations, United Nations, https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/energy/.
“Hydroelectric Power Water Use Completed.” Hydroelectric Power Water Use | U.S. Geological Survey, https://www.usgs.gov/special-topics/water-science-school/science/hydroelectric-power-water-use#:~:text=Hydropower%2C%20or%20hydroenergy%2C%20is%20a,create%20electricity%20in%20hydropower%20plants.
“U.S. Energy Information Administration - EIA - Independent Statistics and Analysis.” Renewable Energy Explained - U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/renewable-sources/.