Uses global case studies to examine technological solutions to energy-related environmental problems and suggests that social, economic and political solutions may be needed to avoid serious future environmental damage.

This book provides a comprehensive and contemporary overview of advances in energy and energy storage technologies. Although the coverage is varied and diverse, the book also addresses unifying patterns and trends in order to enrich readers’ understanding of energy and energy storage systems, particularly hydrogen energy storage, including e.g. their morphology, porosity and material structure. Readers will also gain insights into the hydrogen storage performance landscape, based on data released by the US Department of Energy (DOE), providing a basis for understanding real-world applications. The book also discusses the superior hydrogen storage performance of solid-state materials and explores the physical and chemical properties that can potentially affect their performance.

This is a comprehensive yet accessible text that exposes students to the interaction between society and the environment. Each chapter opens with a stimulating case example or scenario that helps students grasp this interaction, while a "Focus on the U.S." feature helps students relate global environmental issues to everyday life in the United States. Students learn how to use social theories to better understand environmental issues, both at home and internationally.

Howard T. Odum possessed one of the most innovative minds of the twentieth century. He pioneered the fields of ecological engineering, ecological economics, and environmental accounting, working throughout his life to better understand the interrelationships of energy, environment, and society and their importance to the well-being of humanity and the planet. This volume is a major modernization of Odum's classic work on the significance of power and its role in society, bringing his approach and insight to a whole new generation of students and scholars. For this edition Odum refines his original theories and introduces two new measures: emergy and transformity. These concepts can be used to evaluate and compare systems and their transformation and use of resources by accounting for all the energies and materials that flow in and out and expressing them in equivalent ability to do work. Natural energies such as solar radiation and the cycling of water, carbon, nitrogen, and oxygen are diagrammed in terms of energy and emergy flow. Through this method Odum reveals the similarities between human economic and social systems and the ecosystems of the natural world. In the process, we discover that our survival and prosperity are regulated as much by the laws of energetics as are systems of the physical and chemical world.

Energy and Society is the first major text to provide an extensive critical treatment of energy issues informed by recent research on energy in the social sciences. Written in an engaging and accessible style it draws new thinking on uneven development, consumption, vulnerability and transition together to illustrate the social significance of energy systems in the global North and South. The book features case studies, examples, discussion questions, activities, recommended reading and more, to facilitate its use in teaching. Energy and Society deploys contemporary geographical concepts and approaches but is not narrowly disciplinary. Its critical perspective highlights connections between energy and significant socio-economic and political processes, such as globalisation, urban isation, international development and social justice, and connects important issues that are often treated in isolation, such as resource availability, energy security, energy access and low-carbon transition. Co-authored by leading researchers and based on current research and thinking in the social sciences, Energy and Society presents a distinctive geographical approach to contemporary energy issues. It is an essential resource for upperlevel undergraduates and Master’s students in geography, environmental studies, urban studies, energy studies and related fields.

Society and the Environment examines today's environmental controversies within a socio-organizational context. After outlining the contours of 'pragmatic environmentalism', Carolan considers the pressures that exist where ecology and society collide, such as population growth and its associated increased demands for food and energy. He also investigates how various ecological issues, such as climate change, are affecting our very own personal health. Finally, he drills into the social/structural dynamics (including political economy and the international legal system) that create ongoing momentum for environmental ills. This interdisciplinary text features a three-part structure in each chapter that covers 'fast facts' about the issue at hand, examines its wide-ranging implications, and offers balanced consideration of possible real-world solutions. New to this edition are 'Movement Matters' boxes, which showcase grassroots movements that have affected legislation. Discussion questions and key terms enhance the text's usefulness, making Society and the Environment the perfect learning tool for courses on environmental sociology.

Energy and Society: An Introduction, Second Edition provides readers with a detailed introduction to energy sources and energy utilization. This book presents an overview of alternative energy issues and technologies, discusses the pros and cons of various energy sources, and explores their impacts on society and the environment.What's New in the S

This book provides incentives for further development of sustainable fuel cycles through a novel and interdisciplinary approach to an Earth science-related topic. The main focus is on geochemical concepts in immobilizing, isolating or neutralizing waste derived from energy production and consumption. The book also addresses the issue of using some types of energy-derived waste as alternative raw materials. Moreover, it highlights research on how certain wastes can be used for energy production, an increasingly important aspect of modern integrated waste management strategies. The main objectives are to: (a) identify the most serious environmental problems related to various types of power generation and associated waste accumulation; (b) present strategies, based on natural analogue materials, for the immobilization of toxic and radioactive waste components through mineralogical barriers; (c) discuss modern procedures for reuse of waste or certain waste components; and (d) review the importance of geochemical modelling in describing and predicting the interaction between waste and the environment.

Agricultural energetics. The 'entropy law' and the economic process. Social-darwinism and ecology. Ecological and pecuniary economics. 'Social engineering' and the 'history of the future'. 'Modern' agriculture: a source of energy? Ethanol form sugar cane. The energy cost of modernizing chinese agriculture. The energy balances of Spanish agriculture (1950s - 1970s). Boussingault, liebig, guano and agrarian chemistry. The history of agricultural energitics: podolinsky. One of the Narodniki. Eduard Sacher's formulation of Podolinsky's principle. Rudolf Clausius: 'On the energy stocks in nature'. The electrical revolution. The club of ideologists. The kaiser's birthday. The coal question. Patrick geddes' critique of economics. Ruskin and geddes. An ecological critique of industrial urbanization. The carrying capacity of the earth, according to pfaundler. The energy cost of horizontal transport. The availability of energy and the energy requirements of humankind. Limits of the growth of food production. A simple account of the second law of thermodynamics. Henry adams''Law of acceleration' in the use of energy. Life against entropy. Soddy's critique of the theory of economic growth. Lancelot Hogben v. Hayek. Methodological individualism and inter-generational allocation. Neo-corporatist and neo-liberal macro-economics. Externalities. Max Weber's chrematistic critique of wilhelm ostwald. Ecological utopianism: popper-lynkeus nad ballod-atlanticus. The history of the future. Marxism and ecology. Political epilogue.

This book offers a critical analysis of core concepts that have influenced contemporary conversations about environment-society relations in academic, political, and civil circles. Considering these conceptualizations are currently shaping responses to environmental crises in fundamental ways, critical reflections on concepts such as the Anthropocene, metabolism, risk, resilience, environmental governance, environmental justice and others, are well-warranted. Contributors to this volume, working across a multitude of areas within environmental social science, scrutinize underlying worldviews and assumptions, asking a common set of key questions: What are the different concepts able to explain? How do they take into account society-environment relations? What social, cultural, or geo-political biases and blinders are inherent? What actions or practices do the concepts inspire? The transdisciplinary engagement and reflexivity regarding concepts of environment-society relations represented in these chapters is needed in all spheres of society—in academia, policy and practice—not the least to confront current tendencies of anti-reflexivity and denialism.