Introduction - Should We Be Worried About Sustainable Energy?

In the 21st century, there has been a large push from organizations, activists, and scientists alike, warning that the world needs to shift away from fossil fuels to renewable energy. The irreversible effects our current energy usage could have on the environment has been a cautionary tale we’ve all grown well accustomed to hearing.

However, in recent years I feel like I’ve stop hearing as much, or at least have stopped seeing as much coverage on climate change. One would think it’s because we’ve been making more progress on renewable energy usage, but the data suggests an alarming trend: Despite growing the world’s green energy sectors, we have grown our dependence on fossil fuels even more instead of phasing it out. This fact combined with the lack of coverage on climate change in recent years is undermining how prevalent and pressing this issue remains in our modern world.

Research Questions

This project explores the following questions:

  1. How has the global energy supply changed over the 21st century across major energy sources?
  2. Which energy sources make up the largest share of global energy supply, and who or what is contributing to this issue?
  3. How has climate change coverage in the media changed over the 21st century?
  4. Is there hope for the growth of green energy sectors into the future?

Visualization 1 - Graph of Energy Source Growth Over Time

The first visualization is a line graph that shows global energy supply by source from 2000 to 2023. Rather than showing a clean replacement of fossil fuels, the pattern suggests that global energy demand has continued to grow across multiple sources.

Visual 2 - How Global Energy is Split Amongst Sources

The second visualization shows each energy source as a percentage or share of the global energy supply over the 21st century. This stacked area chart is important because it shows that growth in renewable energy sectors can be misleading. Renewable sources may have grown in total amount while still remaining a relatively small part of the total global energy system. Not enough progress is being made with these green energy sources contributing a tiny sliver of the world’s energy while fossil fuels still largely dominate.

Visualization 3 - Animation of Rising CO2 Emissions and Global Temperatures

This is an animation of line plots of rising global temperatures and CO2 emissions. These two elements are highly related as carbon-dioxide is a greenhouse gas, traping heat in the atmosphere causing temperatures to rise. We can see that year after year, we are adding billions of tonnes of this gas into our atmosphere and the amount we’re putting into the atmosphere has been steadily increasing over the 21st century. By pairing this with a plot showing temperatures steadily rising, we can see how instead of making efforts to decrease our pollution of the atmosphere, we’re on alarming path of causing more harm to the planet.

Visualization 4 - Interactive App of Countries

This is an interactive Shiny App that lets you hover over each country to see its CO2 emissions for the year of 2024 and what percent it contributed to the entire world’s emissions. You can also see which countries are contributing the most to fossil fuel production using the drop down menu. This interactive app builds off of the previous visualizations, as we can now see which countries are using the most fossil fuels as well as producing them, helping give more clarity to how the billions of tonnes of CO2 are being put into the atmosphere for a given year.

Visualization 5 - CO2 Contributions from Various Industries

This tree map further breaks down CO2 contribution by various global industries. Previously, we saw how countries contributed to global emissions figures and this plot sheds light on how the globe as a whole spends its energy budget. By looking at a single year’s data, we are seeing a specific snapshot of our energy consumption instead of just general yearly trends.

Visualization 6 - Interactive App of Energy Comparisons

For visualization 6, this interactive shiny app allows you to make much more direct comparisons between energy sources of your choice in the plot style of your choice as well as the years of your choosing. Building off of earlier visuals, this sheds light on more specific trends and metrics for any particular energy source.

Visualization 7 - Decline of Media Coverage in Recent Years

This bar plot shows how media coverage of climate change has changed over the years. We can see that since 2021, coverage has been on a decline with 2025 having the lowest levels of coverage since 2018. This data from MeCCO tracked the average number of climate change related articles per media outlet for each month of the year. This graph compares the peak number of articles published for each given year.

Visualization 8 - Investments in Clean Energy

This final plot is a stacked area chart showing how investments in renewable energy have steadily grown over the 21st century. Despite growth in fossil fuels and concerning amounts of media coverage, this plot shows a positive trend that can help upset the balance in energy sources. Investments and commitment to cleaner energy sources today can help establish a more sustainable future before it’s too late.