The Material Limits of Energy Transition: Thanatia

The Material Limits of Energy Transition: Thanatia PDF Author: Alicia Valero
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 3030785335
Category : Electronic books
Languages : en
Pages : 273

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Book Description
Earth has become a huge mine, with a greater quantity and variety of fundamental mineral resources being extracted year after year. Technology, from electric cars to everyday electrical equipment, consume vast amounts of scarce raw materials. On a planet with limited resources, are these minerals being properly assessed? Will there be enough raw materials to meet the demand of a world population on track to reach 10 billion people? What will be the consequences of accelerated resource depredation? Will the planet one day become 'Thanatia', a resource-exhausted Earth? This book allows readers to understand the mineral heritage of the Earth, considering the demand for raw materials in society, comparing it with the availability of resources on Earth and the impact of mining. The basics of physical geonomics are exlpained, allowing readers to analyse the loss of mineral resources on the planet. The impact of renewable energies and technologies, including electric vehicles, are studied. The book concludes with possible solutions to mineral depletion, from increasing recycling rates, ecodesign measures or alternative sources of mineral resources. Providing numerous tables and illustrations, 'The Material Limits of Energy Transition: Thanatia' gives readers a thorough understanding of mineral depletion. Exploring geology, geochemistry, mining, metallurgy, the environment and thermodynamics, this is a truly holistic book.

The Material Limits of Energy Transition: Thanatia

The Material Limits of Energy Transition: Thanatia PDF Author: Alicia Valero
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 3030785335
Category : Electronic books
Languages : en
Pages : 273

Get Book

Book Description
Earth has become a huge mine, with a greater quantity and variety of fundamental mineral resources being extracted year after year. Technology, from electric cars to everyday electrical equipment, consume vast amounts of scarce raw materials. On a planet with limited resources, are these minerals being properly assessed? Will there be enough raw materials to meet the demand of a world population on track to reach 10 billion people? What will be the consequences of accelerated resource depredation? Will the planet one day become 'Thanatia', a resource-exhausted Earth? This book allows readers to understand the mineral heritage of the Earth, considering the demand for raw materials in society, comparing it with the availability of resources on Earth and the impact of mining. The basics of physical geonomics are exlpained, allowing readers to analyse the loss of mineral resources on the planet. The impact of renewable energies and technologies, including electric vehicles, are studied. The book concludes with possible solutions to mineral depletion, from increasing recycling rates, ecodesign measures or alternative sources of mineral resources. Providing numerous tables and illustrations, 'The Material Limits of Energy Transition: Thanatia' gives readers a thorough understanding of mineral depletion. Exploring geology, geochemistry, mining, metallurgy, the environment and thermodynamics, this is a truly holistic book.

Thanatia

Thanatia PDF Author: Antonio Valero Capilla
Publisher: World Scientific Publishing Company Incorporated
ISBN: 9789814273930
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 629

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Book Description
Is Gaia becoming Thanatia, a resource exhausted planet? For how long can our high-tech society be sustained in the light of declining mineral ore grades, heavy dependence on un-recycled critical metals and accelerated material dispersion? These are all root causes of future disruptions that need to be addressed today. This book presents a cradle-to-cradle view of the Earth's abiotic resources through a novel and rigorous approach based on the Second Law of Thermodynamics: heat dissipates and materials deteriorate and disperse. Quality is irreversibly lost. This allows for the assessment of such depletion and can be used to estimate the year where production of the main mineral commodities could reach its zenith. By postulating Thanatia, one acquires a sense of destiny and a concern for a unified global management of the planet's abiotic resource endowment. The book covers the core aspects of geology, geochemistry, mining, metallurgy, economics, the environment, thermodynamics and thermochemistry. It is supported by comprehensive databases related to mineral resources, including detailed compositions of the Earth's layers, thermochemical properties of over 300 substances, historical energy and mineral resource inventories, energy consumption and environmental impacts in the mining and metallurgical sector and world recycling rates of commodities.

Critical Materials and Sustainability Transition

Critical Materials and Sustainability Transition PDF Author: Arda Işıldar
Publisher: CRC Press
ISBN: 1003810934
Category : Technology & Engineering
Languages : en
Pages : 179

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Book Description
Critical minerals play a vital role in the ongoing energy transition, which aims to shift global energy systems towards more sustainable and low-carbon alternatives. These minerals, also known as critical minerals, are essential components in various clean energy technologies such as wind turbines, solar panels, electric vehicles, and energy storage systems. They possess unique properties that enable efficient energy generation, storage, and transmission. For instance, neodymium, a rare earth element, is crucial for the production of high-performance magnets used in wind turbines and electric motors. Lithium, another critical mineral, is a key component in rechargeable batteries powering electric vehicles and energy storage solutions. As the demand for clean energy technologies continues to rise, securing a sustainable and reliable supply of critical minerals becomes increasingly important to support the global energy transition and reduce dependence on fossil fuels. In this book, we investigate various aspects of critical mineral governance in the context of sustainability transition. We give perspectives around the critical metal requirements of sustainability transition in a forward-looking manner. We discuss the answers to the following questions: What role do the critical raw materials play in the transition to a sustainable economy and energy systems transformation? What are the bottlenecks in achieving a sustainable critical material supply? How do the critical minerals enable renewable energy transition and sustainable development? What is their role in the sustainability transition? How is mineral criticality assessed? And how critical are minerals? What are some regional differences in terms of critical mineral availability, processing capacity, and the supply chain? What strategy should be followed in deciding between primary raw materials and secondary raw materials in supplying critical raw materials for the transition to a sustainable economy? What is the (known) critical material budget, and how does it fit with the climate pledges? The authors of the chapters of this book take a multi-perspective approach and provide insights from industrial ecology, environmental engineering, and sustainable management of natural resources. The information provided will help readers to understand critical metal requirements of present and future key technologies and will help societies to develop and implement sustainable supply strategies.

The Material Basis of Energy Transitions

The Material Basis of Energy Transitions PDF Author: Alena Bleicher
Publisher: Academic Press
ISBN: 0128235543
Category : Technology & Engineering
Languages : en
Pages : 258

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Book Description
The Material Basis of Energy Transitions explores the intersection between critical raw material provision and the energy system. Chapters draw on examples and case studies involving energy technologies (e.g., electric power, transport) and raw material provision (e.g., mining, recycling), and consider these in their regional and global contexts. The book critically discusses issues such as the notion of criticality in the context of a circular economy, approaches for estimating the need for raw materials, certification schemes for raw materials, the role of consumers, and the impact of renewable energy development on resource conflicts. Each chapter deals with a specific issue that characterizes the interdependency between critical raw materials and renewable energies by examining case studies from a particular conceptual perspective. The book is a resource for students and researchers from the social sciences, natural sciences, and engineering, as well as interdisciplinary scholars interested in the field of renewable energies, the circular economy, recycling, transport, and mining. The book is also of interest to policymakers in the fields of renewable energy, recycling, and mining, professionals from the energy and resource industries, as well as energy experts and consultants looking for an interdisciplinary assessment of critical materials. Provides a comprehensive overview of key issues related to the nexus between renewable energy and critical raw materials Explores interdisciplinary perspectives from the natural sciences, engineering, and social sciences Discusses critical strategies to address the nexus from a practitioner's perspective

Thermodynamics for Sustainable Management of Natural Resources

Thermodynamics for Sustainable Management of Natural Resources PDF Author: Wojciech Stanek
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 3319486497
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 510

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Book Description
This book examines ways of assessing the rational management of nonrenewable resources. Integrating numerous methods, it systematically exposes the strengths of exergy analysis in resources management. Divided into two parts, the first section provides the theoretical background to assessment methods, while the second section provides practical application examples. The topics covered in detail include the theory of exergy cost and thermo-ecological cost, cumulative calculus and life cycle evaluation. This book serves as a valuable resource for researchers looking to investigate a range of advanced thermodynamic assessments of the influence of production processes on the depletion of nonrenewable resources.

Elgar Encyclopedia of Ecological Economics

Elgar Encyclopedia of Ecological Economics PDF Author: Emilio Padilla Rosa
Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing
ISBN: 180220041X
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 559

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Book Description
With diverse contributions from over 100 authors around the globe, this comprehensive Encyclopedia summarises the developments of ecological economics from the fundamental contributions to the more recent methodological debates in the field. It provides an expansive list of topics including sustainable development, the limits to growth, agroecology, implications of thermodynamic laws for economics, integrated ecologic-economic modelling, valuation of natural resources and services, and renewable and non-renewable resources management. This title contains one or more Open Access chapters.

Hydrogen Production and Energy Transition

Hydrogen Production and Energy Transition PDF Author: Marcel Van de Voorde
Publisher: de Gruyter
ISBN: 9783110596229
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Carbon neutral hydrogen technologies play a role in preventing climate change and therefore maximizing production of hydrogen in a clean efficient manner is critical to the hydrogen economy. This book deals with the theory and technologies needed for hydrogen production including from algae, solar, and many other areas. Ideal for researchers, engineers, and advanced students of materials science, chemistry, industrial chemistry, and physics.

Energy, Complexity and Wealth Maximization

Energy, Complexity and Wealth Maximization PDF Author: Robert Ayres
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 331930545X
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 593

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Book Description
This book is about the mechanisms of wealth creation, or what we like to think of as evolutionary "progress." The massive circular flow of goods and services between producers and consumers is not a perpetual motion machine; it has been dependent for the past 150 years on energy inputs from a finite storage of fossil fuels. In this book, you will learn about the three key requirements for wealth creation, and how this process acts according to physical laws, and usually after some part of the natural wealth of the planet has been exploited in an episode of "creative destruction." Knowledge and natural capital, particularly energy, will interact to power the human wealth engine in the future as it has in the past. Will it sputter or continue along the path of evolutionary progress that we have come to expect? Can the new immaterial wealth of information and ideas, which makes up the so-called knowledge economy, replace depleted natural wealth? These questions have no simple answers, but this masterful book will help you to understand the grand challenge of our time. Praise for Energy, Complexity and Wealth Maximization: “... people who run the modern world (politicians, economists and lawyers) have a very poor grasp of how it really works because they do not understand the fundamentals of energy, exergy and entropy ... those decision-makers would greatly benefit from reading this book ...” - Vaclav Smil, Distinguished Professor Emeritus, University of Manitoba “... A grandiose design; impressive, worth reading and reflecting!” - Prof. Dr. Ernst Ulrich von Weizäcker, Founder of Wuppertal Institute; Co-President of the Club of Rome, Former Member of the German Bundestag, co-chair of the UN’s Resource Panel “... The book is a must read for concerned citizens and decision makers across the globe.” - RK Pachauri, Founder and Executive Vice Chairman, The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI) and ex-chair, International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)

The Seneca Effect

The Seneca Effect PDF Author: Ugo Bardi
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 3319572075
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 219

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Book Description
The essence of this book can be found in a line written by the ancient Roman Stoic Philosopher Lucius Annaeus Seneca: "Fortune is of sluggish growth, but ruin is rapid". This sentence summarizes the features of the phenomenon that we call "collapse," which is typically sudden and often unexpected, like the proverbial "house of cards." But why are such collapses so common, and what generates them? Several books have been published on the subject, including the well known "Collapse" by Jared Diamond (2005), "The collapse of complex societies" by Joseph Tainter (1998) and "The Tipping Point," by Malcom Gladwell (2000). Why The Seneca Effect? This book is an ambitious attempt to pull these various strands together by describing collapse from a multi-disciplinary viewpoint. The reader will discover how collapse is a collective phenomenon that occurs in what we call today "complex systems," with a special emphasis on system dynamics and the concept of "feedback." From this foundation, Bardi applies the theory to real-world systems, from the mechanics of fracture and the collapse of large structures to financial collapses, famines and population collapses, the fall of entire civilzations, and the most dreadful collapse we can imagine: that of the planetary ecosystem generated by overexploitation and climate change. The final objective of the book is to describe a conclusion that the ancient stoic philosophers had already discovered long ago, but that modern system science has rediscovered today. If you want to avoid collapse you need to embrace change, not fight it. Neither a book about doom and gloom nor a cornucopianist's dream, The Seneca Effect goes to the heart of the challenges that we are facing today, helping us to manage our future rather than be managed by it.

Linkages of Sustainability

Linkages of Sustainability PDF Author: T. E. Graedel
Publisher: Strungmann Forum Reports
ISBN:
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 560

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Book Description
In this book, experts engage in an extended dialogue arguing for a comprehensive view of sustainability. They emphasize the constraints imposed by the relationships among the components, for example, how the need for clean, easily accessible water intersects with the need for the energy required to provide it. This book urges a transformation in the way we view sustainability, a transformation that is necessary if we are to plan responsibly for a more sustainable world.--[book jacket].