Power to the People
Power to the People

Author: Astrid Kander

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Published: 2015-12-29

Total Pages: 472

ISBN-13: 0691168229

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Power to the People examines the varied but interconnected relationships between energy consumption and economic development in Europe over the last five centuries. It describes how the traditional energy economy of medieval and early modern Europe was marked by stable or falling per capita energy consumption, and how the First Industrial Revolution in the eighteenth century--fueled by coal and steam engines--redrew the economic, social, and geopolitical map of Europe and the world. The Second Industrial Revolution continued this energy expansion and social transformation through the use of oil and electricity, but after 1970 Europe entered a new stage in which energy consumption has stabilized. This book challenges the view that the outsourcing of heavy industry overseas is the cause, arguing that a Third Industrial Revolution driven by new information and communication technologies has played a major stabilizing role. Power to the People offers new perspectives on the challenges posed today by climate change and peak oil, demonstrating that although the path of modern economic development has vastly increased our energy use, it has not been a story of ever-rising and continuous consumption. The book sheds light on the often lengthy and complex changes needed for new energy systems to emerge, the role of energy resources in economic growth, and the importance of energy efficiency in promoting growth and reducing future energy demand.

Economic Growth, Energy Consumption and CO2 Emissions in Sweden, 1800-2000
Economic Growth, Energy Consumption and CO2 Emissions in Sweden, 1800-2000

Author: Astrid Kander

Publisher:

Published: 2002

Total Pages: 290

ISBN-13:

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The PhD dissertation discusses large transformations of technologies have occurred in the Swedish economy during the last two centuries, resulting in higher income, better quality of products and changing composition of GDP. An agrarian society has given way to an industrial society and lately to a post-industrial phase. The energy supply systems have changed, from traditional energy carriers, such as firewood and muscle energy to modern carriers like coal, oil and electricity, with effects on CO2 emissions. Not only has the energy supply gone through fundamental changes, but also forest management, which affects the net emissions of CO2. The interrelations of growth, energy and CO2 are analyzed in this thesis, which uses standard calculations

Economic History of Energy and Environment
Economic History of Energy and Environment

Author: S. Sugiyama

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2015-05-15

Total Pages: 139

ISBN-13: 4431555072

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This book is the first volume of a monograph series published by the Socio-Economic History Society, Japan. The purpose of the series is to make works by Japanese scholars accessible to a wider readership and to increase the knowledge of scholars in this field, particularly in relation to Asia. This volume includes four chapters on energy and the environment of Japan, China and Britain and four short book reviews on recent academic works published in Japanese and English. The four chapters cover the following topics: the relationship between deforestation and the development of the silk reeling industry in a district of Nagano Prefecture (central Japan) from the 1870s to the 1900s and the subsequent shift from firewood to coal; the importance of timber supplies for the development of industry as illustrated by a case study on the supply of timber for use as rail sleepers in the Japanese national railway network during the prewar period; a methodological survey of the history of ecology and the environment in China; and an analysis of the British Smoke Nuisance Abatement Act of 1821 as a measure that incorporated the interests of politicians, landlords and industrialists.

The Basic Environmental History
The Basic Environmental History

Author: Mauro Agnoletti

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2014-10-15

Total Pages: 268

ISBN-13: 3319091808

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This book is an introductory instrument to the main themes of environmental history, illustrating its development over time, methodological implications, results achieved and those still under discussion. But the overriding aspiration is to show that the doubts, methods and knowledge elaborated by environmental history have a heuristic value that is far from negligible precisely in its attitude to the most consolidated major historiography. For this reason, this book gives an overview of environmental history as it is an essential component of the basic knowledge of global history. At the same time, it introduces specific aspects which are useful both for anyone wanting to deepen his/her studies of environmental historiography and for those interested in one of the many disciplinary areas – from rural history to urban history, from the history of technology to the history of public health, etc. with which environmental history develops a dialogue.

Energy and Civilization
Energy and Civilization

Author: Vaclav Smil

Publisher: MIT Press

Published: 2018-11-13

Total Pages: 564

ISBN-13: 0262536161

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A comprehensive account of how energy has shaped society throughout history, from pre-agricultural foraging societies through today's fossil fuel–driven civilization. "I wait for new Smil books the way some people wait for the next 'Star Wars' movie. In his latest book, Energy and Civilization: A History, he goes deep and broad to explain how innovations in humans' ability to turn energy into heat, light, and motion have been a driving force behind our cultural and economic progress over the past 10,000 years. —Bill Gates, Gates Notes, Best Books of the Year Energy is the only universal currency; it is necessary for getting anything done. The conversion of energy on Earth ranges from terra-forming forces of plate tectonics to cumulative erosive effects of raindrops. Life on Earth depends on the photosynthetic conversion of solar energy into plant biomass. Humans have come to rely on many more energy flows—ranging from fossil fuels to photovoltaic generation of electricity—for their civilized existence. In this monumental history, Vaclav Smil provides a comprehensive account of how energy has shaped society, from pre-agricultural foraging societies through today's fossil fuel–driven civilization. Humans are the only species that can systematically harness energies outside their bodies, using the power of their intellect and an enormous variety of artifacts—from the simplest tools to internal combustion engines and nuclear reactors. The epochal transition to fossil fuels affected everything: agriculture, industry, transportation, weapons, communication, economics, urbanization, quality of life, politics, and the environment. Smil describes humanity's energy eras in panoramic and interdisciplinary fashion, offering readers a magisterial overview. This book is an extensively updated and expanded version of Smil's Energy in World History (1994). Smil has incorporated an enormous amount of new material, reflecting the dramatic developments in energy studies over the last two decades and his own research over that time.

Economic Development and Environmental History in the Anthropocene
Economic Development and Environmental History in the Anthropocene

Author: Gareth Austin

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing

Published: 2017-10-19

Total Pages: 345

ISBN-13: 1474267491

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For the populations of the developing economies – the vast majority of humanity – the present century offers the prospect of emulating Western standards of living. This hope is combined with increasing awareness of the environmental consequences of the very process of global industrialisation itself. This book explores the interactions between economic development and the physical environment in four regions of the developing world: Sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia, Southeast Asia and East Asia. The contributors focus on the 'Anthropocene': our present era, in which humanity's influence on the physical environment has begun to mark the geological record. Economic Development and Environmental History in the Anthropocene examines environmental changes at global level and human responses to environmental opportunities and constraints on more local and regional scales, themes which have been insufficiently studied to date. This volume fills this gap in the literature by combining historical, economic and geographical perspectives to consider the implications of the Anthropocene for economic development in Asia and Africa.

Environmental and Energy Policy and the Economy
Environmental and Energy Policy and the Economy

Author: Matthew J. Kotchen

Publisher: University of Chicago Press

Published: 2022-01-24

Total Pages: 275

ISBN-13: 0226821749

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This volume presents six new papers on environmental and energy economics and policy in the United States. Rebecca Davis, J. Scott Holladay, and Charles Sims analyze recent trends in and forecasts of coal-fired power plant retirements with and without new climate policy. Severin Borenstein and James Bushnell examine the efficiency of pricing for electricity, natural gas, and gasoline. James Archsmith, Erich Muehlegger, and David Rapson provide a prospective analysis of future pathways for electric vehicle adoption. Kenneth Gillingham considers the consequences of such pathways for the design of fuel vehicle economy standards. Frank Wolak investigates the long-term resource adequacy in wholesale electricity markets with significant intermittent renewables. Finally, Barbara Annicchiarico, Stefano Carattini, Carolyn Fischer, and Garth Heutel review the state of research on the interactions between business cycles and environmental policy.

Energy and Economic Growth
Energy and Economic Growth

Author: Timothy J. Foxon

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2017-10-18

Total Pages: 234

ISBN-13: 1317210182

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Access to new sources of energy and their efficient conversion to provide useful work have been key drivers of economic growth since the industrial revolution. Western countries now need to transform their energy systems and move away from the single-minded pursuit of economic growth in order to reduce our carbon emissions, and to allow the environmental space for other countries to develop in a more sustainable way. Achieving this requires understanding of the dynamics of economic and industrial change with appreciation of the dependence of economies on ecological systems. Energy and Economic Growth thus examines the links between three issues: history of energy sources, technologies and uses; ecological challenges associated with the current dominant economic growth paradigm; and the future low carbon energy transition to mitigate human-induced climate change. Providing a historical understanding of the relevant connections between physical, social and economic changes, the book enables the reader to better understand the connection between their own energy use and global economic and environmental systems, and to be able to ask the right questions of our political and business leaders. This is a valuable resource for students, scholars and policy makers with an interest in energy, climate change and economic thinking.

Nature and Power
Nature and Power

Author: Joachim Radkau

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2008-02-04

Total Pages: 450

ISBN-13: 9780521616737

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Nature and Power traces the expanding scope of environmental action over the course of history: from initiatives undertaken by individual villages and cities, environmental policy has become a global concern. Efforts to steer human use of nature and natural resources have become complicated, as Nature and Power shows, by particularities of culture and by the vagaries of human nature itself. Environmental history, the author argues, is ultimately the history of human hopes and fears.