The US uses Less Energy than Others

yossigestetner.com ^ | 9/24/09 | Yossi Gestetner

[goods]

My buddy Yossi Gestetner makes a good point:

"The left claims that despite the U.S. having only 5% of the world population, the States use 25% of the world energy, which is – according to the left – very wrong. However I look at it differently: a third of the world economy is (generated) in the USA, yet only a quarter of the world energy supplies get burned here, which means the U.S. actually uses LESS energy than its percentage of the world economy."

[Malsua]

I’ve made that exact point here on FR.

By definition, if the US made all goods, world wide energy consumption would drop by 25%.

[the_Watchman]

That observation is loosely related to the non sequitur often repeated by the left that the U.S. spends more money on health care than any other nation. The proper response is: Of course! We have the largest economy!

[avacado]

Yep, if you run the numbers the USA is the most efficient user of energy in terms of production than any other nation on Earth. We are actually a model of efficiency for other countries. But don't hold your breath for the left or MSM to make that case.

[avacado]

"That observation is loosely related to the non sequitur often repeated by the left that the U.S. spends more money on health care than any other nation. The proper response is: Of course! We have the largest economy!"

Not only a larger economy but we have ADVANCED medicine which costs more. We do more than pass out band-aids as health care.

[texmexis best]

Lost for several years is the fact that the US absorbs more co2 than it emits. Has for a very long time. We contribute nothing to the imaginary global warming.

But the GWers don’t mention it.

[Kirkwood]

You’re going to have to stop making sense.

[wolf78]

a third of the world economy is (generated) in the USA

Except, this is plain wrong (or grossly outdated). If you take the 2008 CIA numbers, the US is nominally 23% (not 33%) of the world economy. Using purchase power parity, it's 20.5%. For comparison purposes: The European Union makes up for 30% of the world economy while consuming 16.5% of the energy.

[wolf78]

Yep, if you run the numbers the USA is the most efficient user of energy in terms of production than any other nation on Earth. We are actually a model of efficiency for other countries. But don't hold your breath for the left or MSM to make that case.

Says who? I'm interested because I think the Japanese or the Germans might beg to differ. Hard data would be appreciated!

[avacado]

Look up world production by country and look up energy use by country. There you have it.

[Venturer]

The left wants us to live in the dark. Like N. Korea.

[wolf78]

What do you define as "production". Industrial output? In tons? In million dollars? In percentage of GDP?

Again, the only relevant comparison would be the EU single market, no other economy even comes close. The industrial sector of the EU comprises ~27% of GDP vs. ~20% of the US, together with the larger overall EU economy resulting in a significantly higher industrial output at a significantly lower overall energy consumption.

So if you take production by country and energy use by country, your numbers don't add up by a longshot. However I'm actually willing to believe that US companies are indeed energy efficient (meaning that the difference is resulting from transport etc.), but I'd like to see some hard evidence for that.

[avacado]

I am not going to argue with you. So forget it! And forget the EU. That’s NOT a country, is it!

World and country GDP.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nominal)

[wolf78]

I am not going to argue with you.

That wasn't what I asked for anyway. I was interested in facts and would like to hear the facts you base your argument upon. The numbers I know are to the contrary but I wanted you to enlighten me in case I overlooked something.

And forget the EU. That’s NOT a country, is it!

I used it for simplification purposes. On a per capita basis it's the average of the respective member states, so the numbers are relevant indeed. I could've also used Japan (slightly lower GDP per capita than the US) times 2.5 or Germany (approx. the same GDP per capita as the US) x 3.7, that would've been a bit more complicated, but the general sentiment (higher per capita industrial output at lower energy consumption) would've been the same.

[uncommonsense]

The USA runs the vast majority of the world’s computing infrastructure. That takes an amazing amount of power to run the CPUs, arrays of drives, and the cooling to keep it from melting down. Electricity is the largest expense for many data centers.