Thermo-Ecological Cost (TEC)-comparison of energy-ecological efficiency of renewable and non-renewable energy technologies

The article presents problems related to the assessment of local energy efficiency of energy systems. In practice, local energy efficiency is commonly used to evaluate these systems, which is not a correct criterion to compare different energy technologies, especially non-renewable and renewable energy systems. For the correct assessment of efficiency, a system analysis in the global balance boundary should be used. In the paper system analysis algorithm is discussed - Thermo-Ecological Cost (TEC), which is a correct tool to compare energy and ecological efficiency of different energy systems. Problems with the correct application of the energy and environmental efficiency assessment are illustrated with examples of results of local and system (TEC) evaluation of non-renewable and renewable energy systems efficiency.