Kicking the Carbon Habit
Global Warming and the Case for Renewable and Nuclear Energy
-
- €32.99
-
- €32.99
Publisher Description
With glaciers melting, oceans growing more acidic, species dying out, and catastrophic events like Hurricane Katrina ever more probable, strong steps must be taken now to slow global warming. Further warming threatens entire regional economies and the well being of whole populations, and in this century alone, it could create a global cataclysm. Synthesizing information from leading scientists and the most up-to-date research, science journalist William Sweet examines what the United States can do to help prevent climate devastation.
Rather than focusing on cutting oil consumption, which Sweet argues is expensive and unrealistic, the United States should concentrate on drastically reducing its use of coal. Coal-fired plants, which currently produce more than half of the electricity in the United States, account for two fifths of the country's greenhouse gas emissions of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Sweet believes a mixture of more environmentally sound technologies-wind turbines, natural gas, and nuclear reactors-can effectively replace coal plants, especially since dramatic improvements in technology have made nuclear power cleaner, safer, and more efficient.
Sweet cuts through all the confusion and controversies. He explores dramatic advances made by climate scientists over the past twenty years and addresses the various political and economic issues associated with global warming, including the practicality of reducing emissions from automobiles, the efficacy of taxing energy consumption, and the responsibility of the United States to its citizens and the international community to reduce greenhouse gases. Timely and provocative, Kicking the Carbon Habit is essential reading for anyone interested in environmental science, economics, and the future of the planet.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Polar icecaps are melting, ocean levels are rising, greenhouse gas emissions are accelerating and, says Sweet, the villain of catastrophic climate change is coal, whose sooty carbon emissions make it the single worst energy source. That's the essence of science journalist Sweet's sweeping survey of the America's energy options. He's no fan of oil but acknowledges that its use is too entrenched in our car-driven culture for consumption to be cut anytime soon. He's pessimistic about the time line for implementing fuel-cell technology and sees no fast fix through solar power. And while he agrees that natural gas is cleaner than oil or coal, transmission and storage costs, as well as Chinese and Indian competition for supplies, limit its usefulness for America. That leaves wind generation, among the cleanest energy sources, and nuclear plants, perhaps the most feared, as his chosen methods for powering America's future. Sweet points to Denmark and Great Britain among countries turning to wind farms as a major source of electric power. And in an argument that will dismay many, he cites the Chernobyl nuclear disaster as an aberration in the generally safe record of nuclear energy. It's a grim but realistic assessment.
