Internet cartoonist Randall Munroe answers absurd questions with technically-correct, if flippant answers. In his recent book, he answered the question of whether a typical U.S. can be can energy self-sufficient. The answer is fun and a little interesting so I thought I''d summarise it here:
The Median U.S. house sits on a 0.2 acre plot (of which it occupies 25%) and consumes ~1kW averaged over the year. All potential sources of energy available are considered, either directly on your 0.2 acres or as a pro-rata share for the entire U.S. No consideration of technically feasibility is given to harnessing energy sources on small scales.
Biomass
Sustainably grown & harvested pine on 0.2 acres: 38W average, forever
Switchgrass: 150W
Water
The U.S. averages 31 inches of rain over its whole land area at an average elevation of 2500 ft, giving a total potential of 1.7 TW, or 14 kW per household. Actual total exploitable hydroelectric power is much less: 85 GW, or 700W per household.
Mineable reserves
Your 0.2 acres represents 1/12,000,000,000 of the U.S. If mineable resources were evenly distributed you'd have:
3 barrels of oil: enough to power your house for 8 months
38,000 cubic feet of natural gas: enough for 16 months
19 tons of coal: enough for 12 years
1.5 ounces of uranium: enough to a few months in a conventional reactor, or a decade in a fast neutron reactor
Total non-renewable sources are sufficient to power your house at 1 kW for a few decades
Geothermal
If your house is in a typical geologically quiet area, heat flow would be approx 50mW per sqaure metre, or 40W indefinitely for your 0.2 acre plot
If you live in a geologically active area like The Geysers geothermal plant in NorCal, which produces 77 kW per acre, you have 15kW available
Techtonic
If you lived on a fault line with movement of 1 inch per year and you could somehow build a piston and turbine device to harness this movement you could generate 1 kW - if the pistons had an area of 0.2 acres and operated at 800 MPa. The devices and it's extensive anchors are estimated to weigh 60 billion tons and cost $40 billion in materials.
Solar
Average insolation in the U.S. is 200W per square metre averaged over the year. With 15% efficient panels, your 0.2 acre plot would generate 25 kW
Wind
An average area like St. Louis has a wind power potential of about 50W per square metre at 50 metres above the ground, 200 W/m^2 at 100 m and approx 400 W/m^2 at 200m. A very windy area like the Rockies might be 4x those figures, while central Georgia & Alabama might be a quarter of those.
The maximum size turbine that can be fitted on 0.2 acres is 28 metres in diameter (40 metres if fitted diagonally). If installed 50 metres off the ground in an area with 100 W/m^2 and assuming 30% efficiency, total power would be around 19 kW.
Space Itself
If spacetime contains residual tension after settling out from the Big Bang, it is not a true vacuum and contains a lot of potential energy per cubic metre. If you could decay this false vacuum it could release the energy of the Higgs field, probably as extremely high energy radiation. However, it would also form a bubble of true vacuum that would expand at the speed of light, ultimately destroying and collapsing the entire universe.
I recommend the book, "How To" by Randall Munroe. This one chapter was not intended as a serious examination of energy sources, but I found it revealed just how unsustainable fossil fuels, and even nuclear, look from even a cursory inspection. It's also surprising just how good solar & wind look.
The Median U.S. house sits on a 0.2 acre plot (of which it occupies 25%) and consumes ~1kW averaged over the year. All potential sources of energy available are considered, either directly on your 0.2 acres or as a pro-rata share for the entire U.S. No consideration of technically feasibility is given to harnessing energy sources on small scales.
Biomass
Sustainably grown & harvested pine on 0.2 acres: 38W average, forever
Switchgrass: 150W
Water
The U.S. averages 31 inches of rain over its whole land area at an average elevation of 2500 ft, giving a total potential of 1.7 TW, or 14 kW per household. Actual total exploitable hydroelectric power is much less: 85 GW, or 700W per household.
Mineable reserves
Your 0.2 acres represents 1/12,000,000,000 of the U.S. If mineable resources were evenly distributed you'd have:
3 barrels of oil: enough to power your house for 8 months
38,000 cubic feet of natural gas: enough for 16 months
19 tons of coal: enough for 12 years
1.5 ounces of uranium: enough to a few months in a conventional reactor, or a decade in a fast neutron reactor
Total non-renewable sources are sufficient to power your house at 1 kW for a few decades
Geothermal
If your house is in a typical geologically quiet area, heat flow would be approx 50mW per sqaure metre, or 40W indefinitely for your 0.2 acre plot
If you live in a geologically active area like The Geysers geothermal plant in NorCal, which produces 77 kW per acre, you have 15kW available
Techtonic
If you lived on a fault line with movement of 1 inch per year and you could somehow build a piston and turbine device to harness this movement you could generate 1 kW - if the pistons had an area of 0.2 acres and operated at 800 MPa. The devices and it's extensive anchors are estimated to weigh 60 billion tons and cost $40 billion in materials.
Solar
Average insolation in the U.S. is 200W per square metre averaged over the year. With 15% efficient panels, your 0.2 acre plot would generate 25 kW
Wind
An average area like St. Louis has a wind power potential of about 50W per square metre at 50 metres above the ground, 200 W/m^2 at 100 m and approx 400 W/m^2 at 200m. A very windy area like the Rockies might be 4x those figures, while central Georgia & Alabama might be a quarter of those.
The maximum size turbine that can be fitted on 0.2 acres is 28 metres in diameter (40 metres if fitted diagonally). If installed 50 metres off the ground in an area with 100 W/m^2 and assuming 30% efficiency, total power would be around 19 kW.
Space Itself
If spacetime contains residual tension after settling out from the Big Bang, it is not a true vacuum and contains a lot of potential energy per cubic metre. If you could decay this false vacuum it could release the energy of the Higgs field, probably as extremely high energy radiation. However, it would also form a bubble of true vacuum that would expand at the speed of light, ultimately destroying and collapsing the entire universe.
I recommend the book, "How To" by Randall Munroe. This one chapter was not intended as a serious examination of energy sources, but I found it revealed just how unsustainable fossil fuels, and even nuclear, look from even a cursory inspection. It's also surprising just how good solar & wind look.
" is often at 500 CO2/kWh, and averages around 10 times MORE CO2 emissions than France via nuclear power 
, but when it comes to the real-world data and facts it appears the doomsayers don't care at all, just like typical politicians.
