Nation Energy System Patterns and Forecasting

This thesis investigates the patterns of each type of energy consumption for fourteen countries, to study the link between energy consumption, economics and population. It was found that for all the countries studied, there is a decrease in energy consumption relative to economic growth. This shows that the world has become less energy based, and is more efficient in using energy to produce economic wealth. The carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions for each fossil fuel type used for electricity genera-tion in New Zealand: coal, gas and oil was also calculated. Gas is the main contributor of CO2 by electricity generation for New Zealand. New Zealand’s CO2 emissions from electricity generation have nearly tripled in the last 12 years. Despite the environmen-tal concerns of global warming and the Kyoto protocol, there has been a large increase in total CO2 emitted. This increase has seen a replacement of gas by coal in order to continue to meet the electricity demand of the nation. New Zealand has a small energy market relative to the global market. World energy market patterns show a recent history of oil declining, coal declining, gas increasin