Energy and American Society
Encyclopedia
Energy and American Society: Thirteen Myths is a 2007 book about energy security
and climate change
, edited by Benjamin K. Sovacool
and Marilyn A. Brown
. The book is suitable for both technical and non-technical audiences since it is written in plain English and is "easily digested by anyone with a rudimentary background or interest in energy economics".
and involved 24 contributing authors with a diverse range of backgrounds. Notable contributors include Amory Lovins
and Joseph Romm.
Benjamin K. Sovacool is a Visiting Associate Professor at Vermont Law School
and founding Director of the Energy Justice Program at their Institute for Energy and Environment. He was formerly an Assistant Professor and Research Fellow at the National University of Singapore
.
Marilyn A. Brown is an American
geographer
on the faculty of the Georgia Institute of Technology
. She is a member of the National Commission on Energy Policy and the Tennessee Valley Authority
board. She previously worked at Oak Ridge National Laboratory
, where she held several leadership positions.
and the Annals of the Association of American Geographers
.
Energy security
Energy security is a term for an association between national security and the availability of natural resources for energy consumption. Access to cheap energy has become essential to the functioning of modern economies. However, the uneven distribution of energy supplies among countries has led...
and climate change
Climate change
Climate change is a significant and lasting change in the statistical distribution of weather patterns over periods ranging from decades to millions of years. It may be a change in average weather conditions or the distribution of events around that average...
, edited by Benjamin K. Sovacool
Benjamin K. Sovacool
Benjamin K. Sovacool is a Visiting Associate Professor at Vermont Law School and founding Director of the Energy Justice Program at their Institute for Energy and Environment. He was formerly an Assistant Professor and Research Fellow at the National University of Singapore.Sovacool's research...
and Marilyn A. Brown
Marilyn A. Brown
Marilyn A. Brown is an American geographer on the faculty of the Georgia Institute of Technology. She is a member of the National Commission on Energy Policy and the Tennessee Valley Authority board. She previously worked at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, where she held several leadership...
. The book is suitable for both technical and non-technical audiences since it is written in plain English and is "easily digested by anyone with a rudimentary background or interest in energy economics".
Thirteen myths
The book discusses and presents counter-arguments to thirteen propositions concerning American culture, energy, the environment, and society:- Myth One – Today’s Energy CrisisEnergy crisisAn energy crisis is any great bottleneck in the supply of energy resources to an economy. In popular literature though, it often refers to one of the energy sources used at a certain time and place, particularly those that supply national electricity grids or serve as fuel for vehicles...
is “HypeHypeHype may refer to:*A media circus*Hype , 1981 album by Robert Calvert*Hype , American comedy television series*Hype!, documentary about the popularity of grunge rock in the early to mid 1990...
”
- Myth Two – The Public is Well Informed About Energy
- Myth Three – High Land Requirements and an Unfavorable Energy Balance Preclude Biomass EthanolEthanolEthanol, also called ethyl alcohol, pure alcohol, grain alcohol, or drinking alcohol, is a volatile, flammable, colorless liquid. It is a psychoactive drug and one of the oldest recreational drugs. Best known as the type of alcohol found in alcoholic beverages, it is also used in thermometers, as a...
from Playing a Large Role in Providing Energy Services
- Myth Four – The Hydrogen EconomyHydrogen economyThe hydrogen economy is a proposed system of delivering energy using hydrogen. The term hydrogen economy was coined by John Bockris during a talk he gave in 1970 at General Motors Technical Center....
is a Panacea to the Nation’s Energy Problems
- Myth Five – Price Signals are Insufficient to Induce Efficient EnergyEfficient energy useEfficient energy use, sometimes simply called energy efficiency, is the goal of efforts to reduce the amount of energy required to provide products and services. For example, insulating a home allows a building to use less heating and cooling energy to achieve and maintain a comfortable temperature...
Investments
- Myth Six – The Barriers to New and Innovative Energy Technologies are Primarily Technical: The Case of Distributed Generation
- Myth Seven – Renewable EnergyRenewable energyRenewable energy is energy which comes from natural resources such as sunlight, wind, rain, tides, and geothermal heat, which are renewable . About 16% of global final energy consumption comes from renewables, with 10% coming from traditional biomass, which is mainly used for heating, and 3.4% from...
Systems Could Never Meet Growing Electricity Demand in America
- Myth Eight – Worldwide Power Systems are Economically and Environmentally Optimal
- Myth Nine – Energy EfficiencyEfficient energy useEfficient energy use, sometimes simply called energy efficiency, is the goal of efforts to reduce the amount of energy required to provide products and services. For example, insulating a home allows a building to use less heating and cooling energy to achieve and maintain a comfortable temperature...
Improvements have Already Reached their Potential
- Myth Ten – Energy Efficiency Measures are Unreliable, Unpredictable, and Unenforceable
- Myth Eleven – Energy R&D Investment Takes Decades to Reach the Market
- Myth Twelve – Climate Policy will Bankrupt the U.S. Economy
- Myth Thirteen – Developing Countries are not Doing their Part in Responding to Concerns about Climate ChangeGlobal warmingGlobal warming refers to the rising average temperature of Earth's atmosphere and oceans and its projected continuation. In the last 100 years, Earth's average surface temperature increased by about with about two thirds of the increase occurring over just the last three decades...
Contributors
The book was produced with support from Oak Ridge National LaboratoryOak Ridge National Laboratory
Oak Ridge National Laboratory is a multiprogram science and technology national laboratory managed for the United States Department of Energy by UT-Battelle. ORNL is the DOE's largest science and energy laboratory. ORNL is located in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, near Knoxville...
and involved 24 contributing authors with a diverse range of backgrounds. Notable contributors include Amory Lovins
Amory Lovins
Amory Bloch Lovins is an American environmental scientist and writer, Chairman and Chief Scientist of the Rocky Mountain Institute. He has worked in the field of energy policy and related areas for four decades...
and Joseph Romm.
Benjamin K. Sovacool is a Visiting Associate Professor at Vermont Law School
Vermont Law School
Vermont Law School is a private, American Bar Association accredited law school located in South Royalton, Vermont . The Law School has one of the United States' leading programs in environmental law, and the Law School is currently ranked #1 in Environmental Law by U.S...
and founding Director of the Energy Justice Program at their Institute for Energy and Environment. He was formerly an Assistant Professor and Research Fellow at the National University of Singapore
National University of Singapore
The National University of Singapore is Singapore's oldest university. It is the largest university in the country in terms of student enrollment and curriculum offered....
.
Marilyn A. Brown is an American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
geographer
Geographer
A geographer is a scholar whose area of study is geography, the study of Earth's natural environment and human society.Although geographers are historically known as people who make maps, map making is actually the field of study of cartography, a subset of geography...
on the faculty of the Georgia Institute of Technology
Georgia Institute of Technology
The Georgia Institute of Technology is a public research university in Atlanta, Georgia, in the United States...
. She is a member of the National Commission on Energy Policy and the Tennessee Valley Authority
Tennessee Valley Authority
The Tennessee Valley Authority is a federally owned corporation in the United States created by congressional charter in May 1933 to provide navigation, flood control, electricity generation, fertilizer manufacturing, and economic development in the Tennessee Valley, a region particularly affected...
board. She previously worked at Oak Ridge National Laboratory
Oak Ridge National Laboratory
Oak Ridge National Laboratory is a multiprogram science and technology national laboratory managed for the United States Department of Energy by UT-Battelle. ORNL is the DOE's largest science and energy laboratory. ORNL is located in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, near Knoxville...
, where she held several leadership positions.
Reviews
Energy and American Society: Thirteen Myths has been reviewed in Energy PolicyEnergy policy
Energy policy is the manner in which a given entity has decided to address issues of energy development including energy production, distribution and consumption...
and the Annals of the Association of American Geographers
Association of American Geographers
The Association of American Geographers is a non-profit scientific and educational society founded in 1904 and aimed at advancing the understanding, study, and importance of geography and related fields...
.
See also
- Alternative Energy: Political, Economic, and Social FeasibilityAlternative Energy: Political, Economic, and Social FeasibilityAlternative Energy: Political, Economic, and Social Feasibility , a 2006 book by Christopher A. Simon, discusses the transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy...
- Clean Energy TrendsClean Energy TrendsClean Energy Trends is a series of reports by Clean Edge which examine markets for solar, wind, geothermal, fuel cells, biofuels, and other clean energy technologies. Since the publication of the first Clean Energy Trends report in 2002, Clean Edge has provided anannual snapshot of both the global...
- Greenhouse Solutions with Sustainable EnergyGreenhouse Solutions with Sustainable EnergyGreenhouse Solutions with Sustainable Energy is a 2007 book by Australian academic Mark Diesendorf. The book puts forward a setof policies and strategies for implementing the most promising clean energy technologies by all spheres of government, business and community organisations...
- The Clean Tech RevolutionThe Clean Tech RevolutionThe Clean Tech Revolution is a 2007 book by Ron Pernick and Clint Wilder, who say that commercializing clean technologies is a profitable enterprise that is moving steadily into mainstream business...
Further reading
- Benjamin K. Sovacool (2008). The Dirty Energy DilemmaThe Dirty Energy DilemmaThe Dirty Energy Dilemma: What’s Blocking Clean Power in the United States is a 2008 book by academic Benjamin K. Sovacool, published by Praeger. In the book, Sovacool explores problems with the current U.S...
: What’s Blocking Clean Power in the United States, Praeger. - Miguel MendonçaMiguel MendoncaMiguel Mendonça is a writer, focussing on sustainability. He studied forestry, landscape management, journalism, geography, history, social science and environmental ethics. He is most associated with work on feed-in tariffs, a renewable energy policy...
, David Jacobs and Benjamin K. Sovacool, (2009). Powering the Green Economy: The Feed-In Tariff Handbook, Earthscan. - Benjamin K. Sovacool (2010). Climate Change and Energy Security: A Global Overview of Technology and Policy Options, MIT Press.