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Wyoming coal mine. Coal, along with many other resources is harvested at a vastly unsustainable rate.

A non-renewable resource is a natural resource that cannot be re-made, re-grown or regenerated on a scale comparative to its consumption. It exists in a fixed amount that is being consumed or used up faster than it can be made by nature. Fossil fuels (such as coal, petroleum and natural gas) and nuclear power are non-renewable resources, as they do not naturally re-form at a rate that makes the way we use them sustainable and consumer materials to produce electricity. A renewable resource differs in that it may be used but not used up. This is as opposed to natural resources such as timber, which re-grows naturally and can, in theory, be harvested sustainably at a constant rate without depleting the existing resource pool and resources such as metals, which, although they are not replenished, are not destroyed when used and can be recycled. It is a resource that can not be re-used

A non-renewable resource is always drawn down with anabolic processes that use up energy.

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Carbon-based non-renewables

Further information: Peak oil

Natural resources such as coal, oil, or natural gas, take millions of years to form naturally and cannot be replaced as fast as they are consumed. Eventually they will become too costly to harvest and humanity will need to find other sources of energy. At present, the main energy sources used by humans are non-renewable; renewable resources, such as solar energy, tidal, wind, and geothermal are yet to be fully utilized.

A temporary oil drilling rig in Western Australia

Some natural resources, called renewable resources, are replaced by natural processes given a reasonable amount of time. Soil, water, forests, plants, and animals are all renewable resources as long as they are properly conserved. Solar, wind, wave, and geothermal energies are based on renewable resources. However, non-renewable resources may take billions of years to form.

Renewable resources such as water, wind power, sun radiation, tidal etc are practically infinite - they cannot be depleted - unlike their non-renewable counterparts, which are likely to run out if not used wisley.^[1]

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Economic models

Hotelling's rule is a 1931 economic model of non-renewable resource management by Harold Hotelling. It shows that efficient exploitation of a nonrenewable and nonaugmentable resource would, under otherwise stable economic conditions, lead to a depletion of the resource. The rule states that this would lead to a net price or "Hotelling rent" for it that rose annually at a rate equal to the rate of interest, reflecting the increasing scarcity of the resource.

The Hartwick Rule provides an important result about the sustainability of welfare in an economy that uses non-renewable resources.

See also: World3, Low-carbon economy, and Hubbert's peak

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See also

• Energy conservation
• Green design
• Hubbert's peak
• Liebig's law of the minimum
• Peak oil
• Overfishing
• Renewable resource

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Notes

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External links

• Non-Renewable Resources at NASA.gov
• Electricity from Non-Hydroelectric Renewable Energy Sources at EPA.gov
• Non-renewable energy resource at EPA.gov
• Environmental impacts of nuclear power at EPA.gov
• Environmental Stewardship at University of Illinois.edu