Structure and Themes
The book is a comprehensive guide to sustainable energy systems and is structured in three sections:
- Introduction to the basic concepts and latest scientific evidence regarding global warming.
- Assessment of energy technologies, including coal, nuclear and more sustainable alternatives.
- Discussion of policies and strategies needed to overcome the non-technical barriers to renewable energies and energy efficiency.
Diesendorf argues that:
- Ecologically sustainable energy technologies based on energy efficiency, renewable energy and natural gas are commercially available today, and that their implementation could halve Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions within a few decades.
- To implement these technologies, new policies must be developed and implemented by all three levels of government.
- The main barriers are neither technical nor economic, but rather our social institutions and the political power of the big greenhouse gas emitting industries: coal, oil, aluminium, cement and motor vehicles.
Read more about this topic: Greenhouse Solutions With Sustainable Energy
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