Passive Heating Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3000 words

Passive Heating - Essay Example The analysis comprises of examples from both the KYOTOi protocol of the United Nations and the Energy performance of Buildings Directive of the European Union that is being enforced across the west for energy efficiency and savings of the conventional sources of energy. The analysis predominantly focuses upon the energy efficiency of the buildings using the passive heating strategy. Nuclear sources also cater the energy requirements in certain cases where it generates the electricity required for the generation of electricity. In all the aforementioned cases, the pollution into the atmosphere due to heating is enormous indirectly because the generation of electricity in case of electric heaters causes pollution of the atmosphere if not in the immediate vicinity of the users whilst the gas heating systems cause the pollution in the vicinity itself. The atmosphere being a single entity, the greenhouse effect spreads across the entire spread of the atmosphere irrespective of the location of emission of Carbon Monoxide and Carbon di-oxide gases. David Taylor (2005)ii further argues that the main reason for the increase in the energy consumption by the domestic buildings is the inability or the reluctance of the people to utilise the energy of sunlight and natural means for cooling during the summer. This is also due to the fact that the increase in the density of the buildings in the urban areas like the busy areas of London where the density of the domestic buildings has increased by more than 10 times in the six years as argued by W. L. Lee and F. W. H. Yik (2005)iii. The study by the authors have proved that the population density increase in the urban areas has accompanied with the steep density of the buildings thus presenting a congested environment for the energy management and the use of natural resources of energy for cooling during the summer. Furthermore, the use of each kWh (kilo Watt hour) of energy Douglas Lancashire (2005) has identified the emission rations as described below 1.5 lb (680 grams) of Carbon Di-Oxide 0.2 ounce (5.67 grams) ounces of Sulphur Di-oxide and 0.08 ounces (2.27 grams) of nitrogen oxides The information presented above reveals that through saving every kWh of electricity alone, a building could contribute to the reduction of emission and pollution of the atmosphere. Even though the pollution is not caused at the surroundings of the building, the fact that the consumption of energy is directly proportional to the emission of gases and pollution by the power generation plant justifies the need for energy efficiency in the buildings. The aforementioned makes it clear that the costs involved with the energy consumption and the maintenance of the heating systems is a critical element both to the homeowners, which is a direct cost whilst the indirect cost is mainly the loss of non-renewable sources of energy and atmospheric pollution. In order to overcome this problem, passive heating is proposed by researchers as an effective alternative. Passive heating as argued by Raymond Ward (2005) is the method of using the non-conventional sources of energy like the solar energy to generate the energy required to cater the heating requirements in domestic buildings. Another source of energy is the wind energy that is in abundance especially in the UK where the sunlight is treated as a rare commodity with only short spells of summer every year. Alongside, passive heating can