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Energy consumption in the USA since 1950

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This simulation allows you to visualize the historical use of energy, starting in 1950. Numbers are given for the annual totals of various energy sources, including coal, oil, gas, nuclear, hydropower, wind, solar, and biomass.

The units are quads, which stands for quadrillions of BTUs (British Thermal Units). 1 quad is approximately 1 x 1018 joules.

Source of the data: US Energy Information Administration.

Simulation written by Andrew Duffy, and first posted on 11-05-2018. Updated 5-15-2019 with 2018 data (plus some adjustments to earlier data). Updated 11-03-2020 with 2019 data (plus some adjustments to earlier data). Update 10-15-2021 with 2020 data (plus some adjustments to earlier data). Update 10-14-2022 with 2021 data (plus some adjustments to earlier data). Update 11-13-2023 with 2022 data (plus some adjustments to earlier data).

Creative Commons License
This work by Andrew Duffy is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
This simulation can be found in the collection at https://physics.bu.edu/~duffy/classroom.html.

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