US Energy Flow Trends

Energy Flow Charts: Charting the Complex Relationships among Energy, Water, and Carbon

Introduction

...From the website... Energy, Water, and Carbon Informatics

Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) produced the first diagrams illustrating U.S. national commodity use in the mid-1970s. The most widely recognized of these charts is the U.S. energy flow chart. LLNL has also published charts depicting carbon (or carbon dioxide potential) flow and water flow at the national level as well as energy, carbon, and water flows at the international, state, municipal, and organizational (e.g., Air Force) level. Flow charts, also referred to as Sankey Diagrams, are single-page references that contain quantitative data about resource, commodity, and byproduct flows in a graphical form. These flow charts help scientists, analysts, and other decision makers to visualize the complex interrelationships involved in managing our nation’s resources.

https://flowcharts.llnl.gov/

Chem 312 Assignment (04/12/22)

As displayed briefly in class, the Estimated US Energy Consumption diagrams available on the LLNL website contain a vast amount of data. As you will see, not only is "energy" data available; other commodities such as carbon dioxide emissions, water usage/sources, as well as some newer hybrid charts.

Your assignment is to develop an interesting comparison between the any of the data, differences by year, by State, by country, by source, by...whatever you can compare. I do not what these instruction to be limiting. If an idea has come to mind when looking at the data, go for it. If an idea does not come to mind, then you can consider using the following as a way to start:

0) Browse the data, become familiar with what these charts are presenting.

1) "This data" is interesting because...

2) When compared with...we see certain trends.

3) "This data" is shown in the Excel file below...

4) ...and now make a concluding statement.

When including a 6.5" x 4" Excel graph your assignment needs to be a minimum one page, single spaced, and should look something like this. Feel free to reference sources outside of the LLNL site. If necessary, you may include the LLNL chart(s) in your document, but in most cases the Excel graph will present specifics.

This assignment will be printed and turned in on Weds 9am...no late work accepted.

Notes: not all years contain all data. You will need to select the year from the pull down and let the page "load" all the data from that year. Then you can select a country (you can enter the first letter in the name to more quickly scroll) and let the page "load." The site does have some bugs so be patient.