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"The Thread of Energy simplifies the world's complexity by discussing energy as the single most influential driver of human actions and decisions. It exposes fundamental influences of energy on our lives, our security, and our relationships with others in an ever-shrinking and complicated world. It examines the typical influence energy has on all human activities, ways of life, ambitions, and costs while illustrating the central role of energy in explaining how the world works and how it will influence the future we are creating. It reduces the myriad interlocking and inscrutable influences on human security and happiness and prepares us - in lay terms - for the coming energy transition. The Thread of Energy weaves a tapestry of all human activities. Energy is the premier driver of human actions, decisions, barriers, and opportunities. Acknowledging and acting upon this accumulated awareness is the first step in illuminating the path to the solutions we must achieve to survive. When we do so, we will have accepted that Energy is a social issue with a technical component rather than the other way around"--
Energy has become a central concern of many strands of geographical inquiry, from global climate change to the effects of energy decisions on our lives. However, many aspects of the ‘black box’ of relationships at the energy-society interface remain unopened, especially in terms of the spatial underpinnings of energy production and consumption within nations, cities and regions. Debates focusing on the location and nature of energy flows frequently fail to consider the multiple geographical networks that illustrate and explain the distribution of fuels and services around the world. Providing an integrated perspective on the complex interdependencies between energy and geography, The Rou...
More than ever, travelers are encountering a different sort of landscape, one not only of nature but of technology. Wind Power in View is the first authoritative discourse on the aesthetic impact of wind turbines on the landscape and what can be done about it. It is a detailed and thoroughly illustrated discussion of the issue from several different perspectives. The book also provides an overview of the status of wind energy at the dawn of the new millennium, examines some of the ongoing battles, and offers guidelines on minimizing its visual impact.Taking examples from the United States, Germany, Denmark, Great Britain, and Sweden, Wind Power in View is the first book to tackle the thorny land use questions raised by wind energy's hard won respectability. What will be the future of wind energy? Will it be welcomed as savior, or will it be opposed as a new-age intrusion on open space and landscape preservation? These 11 essays, international in nature and written by objective experts, address landscape issues in creative, original ways.
Winner of the 2017 EDRA Great Places Award (Research Category) Winner of the 2017 VT ASLA Chapter Award of Excellence (Communications Category) The Renewable Energy Landscape is a definitive guide to understanding, assessing, avoiding, and minimizing scenic impacts as we transition to a more renewable energy future. It focuses attention, for the first time, on the unique challenges solar, wind, and geothermal energy will create for landscape protection, planning, design, and management. Topics addressed include: Policies aimed at managing scenic impacts from renewable energy development and their social acceptance within North America, Europe and Australia Visual characteristics of energy fa...
When a titanic explosion ripped through the Number Four reactor at the Chernobyl Nuclear Plant in 1986, spewing flames and chunks of burning, radioactive material into the atmosphere, one of our worst nightmares came true. As the news gradually seeped out of the USSR and the extent of the disaster was realized, it became clear how horribly wrong things had gone. Dozens died - two from the explosion and many more from radiation illness during the following months - while scores of additional victims came down with acute radiation sickness. Hundreds of thousands were evacuated from the most contaminated areas. The prognosis for Chernobyl and its environs - succinctly dubbed the Zone of Alienat...
NUCLEAR POWER WILL SLOW OUR RESPONSE TO CLIMATE CHANGE AND INCREASE THE RISK OF WEAPONS PROLIFERATION AND CATASTROPHE THE CLIMATE CRISIS has propelled nuclear energy back into fashion. Its proponents argue we already have the technology of the future and that it only needs perfection and deployment. Nuclear Is Not the Solution demonstrates why this sort of thinking is not only naïve but dangerous. Even beyond the horrific implications of meltdown and the intractable problem of waste disposal, nuclear is not practicable on such a large scale. Any appraisal of future energy technology depends on two important parameters: cost and time. Nuclear fails on both counts. It is more costly than its ...
It is widely accepted in the scientific community that climate change is a reality, and that changes are happening with increasing rapidity. In this second edition, leading climate researcher Barrie Pittock revisits the effects that global warming is having on our planet, in light of ever-evolving scientific research. Presenting all sides of the arguments about the science and possible remedies, Pittock examines the latest analyses of climate change, such as new and alarming observations regarding Arctic sea ice, the recently published IPCC Fourth Assessment Report, and the policies of the new Australian Government and how they affect the implementation of climate change initiatives. New mat...
The New North is a book that turns the world literally upside down. Analysing four key 'megatrends' - population growth and migration, natural resource demand, climate change and globalisation - UCLA professor Larry Smith projects a world that by mid-century will have shifted its political and economic axes radically to the north. The beneficiaries of this new order, based on a bonanza of oil, natural gas, minerals and plentiful water will be the Arctic regions of Russia, Alaska and Canada, and Scandinavia. Meanwhile countries closer to the equator will face water shortages, aging populations, crowded megacities and coastal flooding. Smith draws on geography, economics, history, earth and climate science, but what makes his arguments so compelling is that he has spent many months exploring the region, talking to people in once-inaccessible Arctic towns, noting their economies, politics and stories.
In the latter half of the twentieth century, legions of industrial pioneers came to northwestern British Columbia with grand plans for mines, dams, and energy-development schemes. Yet many of their projects failed to materialize or were abandoned midstream. Unbuilt Environments reveals that these lapsed resource projects had lasting effects on the natural and human environment. Drawing on a range of case studies to analyze the social and environmental impacts of unfinished projects, Jonathan Peyton considers development failure a productive concept for northwestern Canada. He looks at a closed asbestos mine, an abandoned rail grade, an imagined series of hydroelectric installations, a failed LNG export facility, and a transmission line – and finds that these unrealized developments continue to shape contemporary resource conflicts.
Bookstore shelves are lined with tomes dedicated to the finest things that life has to offer. This is all well and good, but the real entertainment is to be found not in the cream of the crop, but at the bottom of the barrel. The World's Worst is a celebration/indictment of nearly 50 infamous and little-known exemplars of the awful. In thoroughly researched, scathingly funny essays, author Mark Frauenfelder avoids the obvious and digs deep to tell the fascinating tales of the worst people, places, and things on Earth for the reader's amusement and edification. Half of the entries are also mischieviously illustrated by the author. Addictively readable, and sure to appeal to fans of the popular Worst-Case Scenario and Darwin Awards series, The World's Worst is hilariously unafraid to wallow in the mire. Selected Horrible Highlights: Most Unappealing Fetish Most Disgusting Coffee Drink Most Horrific Self-Help Technique Least Adorable Pet Saddest Fate for an Island Nation Worst Molasses Related Disaster