Resource Energy:
The demand for energy doubles every 14 years and is taken as one of the indicators of development of a country. India, with 16% of the world's population consumes only 1.5% of the total energy produced in the world, in comparison to USA which has 6.25% of the world's population and utilises 33% of the energy produced. This gives us an idea of the low level of our development and should be an incentive to better utilisation of our resources for generating more energy, so that we can meet our growing demands of energy. Even today. about 80% of our population continues to depend on fuelwood, dung and agricultural wastes. We know that non-renewable reserves such as fossil fuels, coal and petroleum, are not going to last for long. Forests are also being depleted at a fast rate due to indiscriminate felling of trees. Therefore, it has become necessary to think of alternative, non-conventional sources of energy. Some of these sources of energy are discussed here.