Out of the Energy Box

THE HEAT IS ON ONLY RICHARD NIXON could go to China. And maybe only oil industry CEOS can lead action on global climate change. Lord Browne, the head of BP, has stated in no uncertain terms that cli mate change is real, and he has made it BP'S responsibility to cut down on the greenhouse-gas emissions that are upsetting the earth's climate. The prognosis for the ftuture of climate change is indeed alarming. Scientists say plausible scenarios include terrible droughts, crop failures, and dying forests around the Mediterranean and in the United States, South America, India, China, and Africa. Sea levels are expected to rise significantly, drowning islands and possibly displacing hundreds of millions of people from coastlines, where more than a third of the world's population lives. Ground water supplies are set to shrink, reservoirs to dry up. Wildfires and violent storms will strike more often and much harder. And much of this change is expected within the next 50 years. Most scientists believe that recent global warming is largely the result of human energy consumption, which releases carbon dioxide, a powerful greenhouse gas, into the atmosphere. Mas sive, almost inconceivable amounts of energy are used to do everything these days, from building airplanes to running sewer systems and hospital equipment. Energy is the essence of modern

Energy (signal processing · Physics · Political science · Global Energy and Sustainability Research

• Environmental Damage, Abandoned Treaties, and Fossil-Fuel Dependence

  Open Access•B K Sovacool•Environment Development and…•2007

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• Coal and nuclear technologies

  Open Access•B K Sovacool•Policy Sciences•2007

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