Agave is a family of short, spiky plants native to the southern USA and Mexico. Traditionally, extracts of agave are used to make Tequila, but agave is also being researched as a large-scale source of ethanol for use in biofuels.

Anthropogenic means caused by humans.

Aviation refers to transportation by air.

A battery stores electrical energy in a chemical form.

To do with people's behavior.

A binary cycle geothermal power plant uses warm water from underground to vaporize a low-boiling compound, which then is used to generate electricity. This is different from traditional geothermal power plants, in which the water itself is vaporised.

Produced from living things.

Butane is a small hydrocarbon with the formula C₄H₁₀.

An area of land being used to grow food crops or other agricultural products.

Statistically significant changes to Earth's weather patterns that occur over long periods of time, from decades to millions of years.

Coal is a naturally occurring solid hydrocarbon mineral that can be burned as a fuel.

A commercial building is used for business or industry, not as a home for people.

Decommissioning refers to closing and demolishing a facility, and safely disposing of the debris.

The electricity distribution system refers to the infrastructure that transfers electricity from the generating station to where the electricity will be used. It includes transmission cables, transformers, and any electricity storage systems in use.

Electricity refers to the presence and motion of electric charge. It is used as a source of energy for much of the world, and generating it can have significant environmental effects.

Electrolysis refers to the use of an electric current to drive a chemical reaction.

The process of being worn away by wind, water, or other processes.

Ethane is a small hydrocarbon with the formula C₂H₆.

Ethanol is a small organic alcohol with the chemical formula C₂H₆O. It can be produced from the fermentation of plant matter.

Fission is the process by which a nucleus breaks apart into two smaller nuclei, releasing energy.

The floor area of a building is the sum of the floor area of each of the floors in a building.

A forest refers to a large area of trees and other vegetation.

Fuel consumption is the amount of fuel it takes to drive a vehicle a given distance. Fuel economy, a related term, is the distance a vehicle can drive on a certain amount of fuel.

Gasoline is a common vehicle fuel. It is mostly hydrocarbons, with many other additives.

A gigatonne (Gt) is one billion tonnes, or 10¹⁵ grams. Typically, concentration of CO₂ in the atmosphere is measured in parts per million (ppm), whereas Gt of carbon is used for amounts of carbon flux and storage.

Something emitting light because it is heated. An incandescent light bulb applies an electric current to a tungsten filament, causing it to emit light.

Producing light

The lifetime of building is the amount of time from its construction to demolition.

Marine transportation refers to transportation by boat.

The mass of a substance (in grams) divided by the amount of that substance (in moles).

A naturally occurring fossil fuel gas containing mostly light hydrocarbons with small amounts of other gases.

Small and insignificant.

Octane is a liquid hydrocarbon with the chemical formula C₈H₁₈.

Photovoltaic solar cells use layers of semiconductors to generate electricity from sunlight.

Photocatalytic solar technologies use sunlight to drive a chemical reaction to produce electricity or fuels.

Propane is a small hydrocarbon with the formula C₃H₈.

Referring to some characteristic or quality of an object.

Referring to the number or quantity of an object.

Rail transportation refers to transportation by train.

The Representative Concentration Pathways are a series of possible climate futures used for climate modeling and research. The four scenarios are RCP2.6, RCP4.5, RCP6.0 and RCP8.5; the number indicates the increase in radiative forcing between pre-industrial times and 2100, in units of W/m2. RCP8.5 represents the worst case scenario in which global carbon emissions continue to increase without mitigation; whereas RCP2.6 sees global carbon emissions drop to zero by 2090.

Sources of energy that are regenerated or regrown on the order of years.

A reservoir is a large artificial lake. Hydroelectric power can be generated by allowing water to flow out of a reservoir and through a turbine.

A residential building is a building in which people live.

A run-of-river hydroelectric power plant uses the natural flow of a river or stream to generate electricity, without the use of large reservoir.

Solar concentrator technologies use mirrors or lenses to focus sunlight onto a point. This increases the efficiency of other solar technologies at that point.

The amount of sunlight that falls on a certain area of ground.

Solar thermal technologies use sunlight to produce heat, which can be used to generate electricity or serve other purposes.

On land.

We can model a coal-fired power plant as a Carnot engine: an idealized heat engine that transfers energy from a hot object to a cold object and does work in the process. The efficiency of a Carnot engine is determined by the temperature of the hot and cold objects (in kelvin): eff=1-(T_cold/T_hot).

Tidal hydroelectricity uses the flow of the tides to generate electricity.

Thorium is a dense, radioactive metal. Thorium-233 is being studied as a replacement for uranium-235 in nuclear power plants.

Uranium is a dense, radioactive metal. One isotope of uranium, uranium-235, is used as fuel in nuclear power plants.

Ventilation refers to the process of moving air into or out of a building.

Wave hydroelectricity uses the energy of waves on oceans or large lakes to generate electricity.