Geo 2026: Saving energy: people, governments, the UAE, Qatar and Nepal

Reduce electricity use: turn off lights and devices; avoid standby; use LED bulbs (your notes: they use about 75 to 85% less energy than old bulbs).
Energy-efficient homes: insulation in walls and roofs (keeps heat in during winter and out in summer); double glazing, heavy curtains and shutters; solar panels; efficient heating (gas fires and underfloor heating; closing doors keeps heat in smaller spaces) and well-insulated hot water tanks.
Reduce waste: reusable bags, buying fewer longer-lasting items.
Carbon footprint: the total greenhouse gases (especially carbon dioxide) produced by a person, product or activity, from electricity, car and plane travel, and things we buy. Measuring it shows which activities to cut.

National government: build large renewable projects (wind and solar farms, HEP); grants for solar panels or heat pumps; energy efficiency laws (insulation, appliances, emissions); fuel and energy taxes; national rail networks; national climate targets.
Local government: solar panels on schools, hospitals and council buildings; cycle lanes and walking routes; recycling and food waste schemes; LED street lights; insulating social housing.
The UAE: large solar power projects; green building rules and efficient air conditioning (important in a hot climate); metro systems, better public transport and electric vehicles; long-term national strategies to cut emissions. Organisations such as Goumbook raise awareness and encourage sustainable lifestyles.

Qatar (rich, gas-based economy): Qatar's economy is built on natural gas, but it is diversifying. The Al Kharsaah solar plant (800 MWp, opened October 2022) can supply about 10% of peak electricity demand and should avoid about 26 million tonnes of CO2 over its life. QatarEnergy aims for 5 GW of renewable capacity by 2035. Suitable because Qatar has strong sunshine and wealth to invest; limits: dust, heat and continued reliance on gas.
Nepal (developing, mountainous): steep rivers make micro hydropower suitable: small plants bring electricity to remote villages beyond the national grid. Benefits: lighting, radios and TVs, mobile phones, computer classes, longer shop hours and mills that replace hard manual work. Problems: when the national grid arrives, many customers switch (over half in some villages), making loans hard to repay; linking micro hydro to the grid is the solution being tried.

Micro hydropower in Nepal shows how the right technology depends on the place.
Why it suits Nepal: Nepal is mountainous, with many fast-flowing rivers and streams. Many villages are remote and far from the national electricity grid, so building power lines to them is very expensive. A micro hydro plant uses a small local river to turn a turbine, giving clean electricity without a large dam.
Benefits: lighting in the evening, radios, TVs and mobile phones, computer classes, longer shop hours and mills that replace hard manual work.
The surprising problem: when the national grid finally reaches a village, many customers switch to it. The micro hydro scheme then has fewer paying customers, so it becomes hard to repay the loans that built it. The solution being tried is to connect micro hydro to the grid, so it can keep selling its electricity.
Lesson: a sustainable scheme must also be financially sustainable.

Mixing up national and local government actions: taxes, laws, national targets and rail networks are national; cycle lanes, LED street lights and solar panels on schools are local.
Saying Qatar has stopped using gas: Qatar is diversifying with solar, but its economy is still built on natural gas.
Describing micro hydro as a big dam: it uses small local rivers and streams, not large reservoirs.
Vague individual actions: explain how each saves energy, for example 'insulation reduces heat loss, so less energy is needed for heating'.
Defining carbon footprint as just CO2 from cars: it is all the greenhouse gases from a person, product or activity.

Your Lesson 11 slide links to a case study of the Chambamontera micro-hydro scheme. Details below are from Internet Geography and tutor2u.
Where: a remote village in the Andes mountains of northern Peru, more than two hours by rough track from the nearest town, Jaén. Most people are subsistence farmers who also grow some coffee.
The problem: steep slopes and roads that close in winter made connecting to the national grid economically impractical, so there was no electricity for lighting, heating or businesses.
The solution: a run-of-the-river micro-hydro scheme built with the charity Practical Action. A canal diverts river water into a small tank (forebay); it then flows down a steep pipe (penstock) to turn a turbine and generator. There is no large dam or reservoir.
Cost: about US$51,000, paid for by the government, Japanese investment and the local community; each family contributed about US$750, with credit to help.
Benefits: electric light replaced kerosene lamps (less fire risk and cleaner indoor air); children can study after dark; vaccines and medicines can be kept cold; new businesses such as coffee processing; and less wood is burned, reducing deforestation and soil erosion.
Why it is sustainable: it is renewable, built with local labour and materials, and cheap to run.

Your class task used an online carbon footprint calculator. Here is how to get the most from it.
1. Calculate honestly: enter your real travel, home energy use, food and shopping.
2. Record: your total score and the one activity that contributed most.
3. Explain: why does that activity produce high emissions? Travel by car or plane burns fossil fuels; electricity may come from fossil fuel power stations; products use energy to make and transport.
4. Judge: is it something you could realistically change? For example, taking the metro instead of being driven is easier than never flying.
Why measure it? Your slide says measuring helps you understand how your lifestyle affects the environment, identify which activities produce the most emissions and learn practical ways to reduce your impact.