Energy : Science, Policy, and the Pursuit of Sustainability

In the early 2000s, energy prices have fluctuated wildly, from historic highs in the winter and spring of 2001 to the lowest wholesale prices in decades a few short months later. As the largest user of fossil-fuel energy, the United States is the key player in the world's energy markets, and our nation's energy policy (or lack thereof) has become a subject of increasing concern.Energy: Science, Policy, and the Pursuit of Sustainabilityis an essential primer on energy, society, and the environment. It offers an accessible introduction to the "energy problem" -- its definition, analysis, and policy implications. Current patterns of energy use are without question unsustainable over the long term, and our dependence on fossil fuels raises crucial questions of security and self-sufficiency. This volume addresses those questions by examining the three broad dimensions of the issue: physical, human, and political-economic. Chapters consider: the laws of nature and the impacts of energy use on our physical and ecological life-support systems the psychological, social, and cultural factors that determine how we use energy the role of government actions in adjusting costs, influencing resource consumption, and protecting the environment how markets work, and the reasons and cures for market failures in responding to long-term environmental and energy problems Energylinks energy use with key environmental issues of population, consumption, and pollution and offers readers a range of material needed for an informed policy perspective.

Andrew Bacher is a professor of physics at Indiana University-Bloomington Randall Baker is director of international programs and professor in the School of Public and Environmental Affairs at Indiana University Robert Bent is professor emeritus of physics at Indiana University-Bloomington Mary Ellen Brown is director of the Institute for Advanced Study and professor of folklore and ethnomusicology at Indiana University Norman S. Care was a professor in the Department of Philosophy at Oberlin College for thirty-five years Lee H. Hamilton is director of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, D.C., and director of the Center on Congress at Indiana University Russell Lee is distinguished research and development staff member for science and technology policy at Oak Ridge National Laboratory Lloyd Orr is professor emeritus of economics and former chair of the economics department at Indiana University-Bloomington John Sheffield is director of the Joint Institute for Energy and Environment at the University of Tennessee and co-director of a joint institute of the Oak Ridge National Laboratory and the Kurchatov Institute in Moscow William Z. Shetter is professor emeritus of Germanic Studies at Indiana University Ian Thomas is currently the physics instructor at Columbia Independent School in Columbia, MO Richard R. Wilk is chair of the department of anthropology at Indiana University, and president of the Society for Economic Anthropology Glenn R. Young is group leader for the Nuclear Physics Experimental Program in the physics division of Oak Ridge National Laboratory