Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-m9kch Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-05-01T08:45:38.748Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Introduction

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 June 2011

By
Bhavik R. Bakshi ,
Timothy G. Gutowski  and
Dušan P. Sekulić
Edited by
Bhavik R. Bakshi ,
Timothy G. Gutowski  and
Dušan P. Sekulić
Bhavik R. Bakshi
Affiliation:
Ohio State University
Timothy G. Gutowski
Affiliation:
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Dušan P. Sekulić
Affiliation:
University of Kentucky
Bhavik R. Bakshi
Affiliation:
Ohio State University
Timothy G. Gutowski
Affiliation:
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Dušan P. Sekulić
Affiliation:
University of Kentucky
Get access

Summary

Resources and Sustainability

This book is about the application of thermodynamic thinking to those new areas of study that are concerned with the human use of resources and the development of a sustainable society. Exactly what a sustainable society is, is a highly debated topic, somewhat subject to personal value preferences. However, what is not sustainable is easier to identify. For example, in Jared Diamond's popular book, Collapse [1], he identified a variety of ancient and modern societies that failed. No one would dispute this claim. Although the reasons for these failures were complex, an important and common contributing factor was an inability to manage Earth's resources and thereby meet the needs of the society. For example, the inhabitants of Easter Island apparently became consumed with building giant stone statues (called moai), which required large timbers for their construction and for their transport from the quarry to the installation site. Apparently this building process, along with the destruction of the seeds wrought by the Polynesian rats, led to the destruction of most, if not all, of their trees. One result from this was a loss of the primary building material for their canoes. Because most fish were some distance from the shore, a lack of building materials for canoes meant fewer fish to eat and the inability to move to other islands. This desperate situation ultimately resulted in the islanders resorting to cannibalism.

Type
Chapter
Information
Thermodynamics and the Destruction of Resources , pp. 1 - 12
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2011

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Diamond, J.Collapse – How Societies Choose to Fail or Survive (Viking Penguin, New York, 2005).Google Scholar
Daily, G. C., Nature's Services: Societal Dependence on Natural Ecosystems (Island Press, Washington, D.C., 1997).Google Scholar
Jorgensen, S. E., Integration of Ecosystem Theories: A Pattern (Kluwer Academic, Dodrecht, The Netherlands, Boston, 1997).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ayres, R. U., Information, Entropy, and Progress: A New Evolutionary Paradigm (American Institute of Physics, College Park, MD, 1994).Google Scholar
Odum, E. P., “Strategy of ecosystem development,” Science 164, 262 (1969).CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Szargut, J., Morris, D. R., and Steward, F. R., Exergy Analysis of Thermal, Chemical and Metallurgical Processes (Hemisphere, New York, 1988).Google Scholar
Carnot, S., Reflections of the Motive Power of Fire (Dover, New York, 1988; originally published 1890).Google Scholar
Gyftopolous, E. P., “Presentation of the foundations of thermodynamics in about twelve one-hour lectures,” in Thermodynamic Optimization of Complex Energy Systems, edited by A. Bejan and E. Mamut (Kluwer, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, 1998), pp. 1–44.Google Scholar
Moran, M. J., Availability Analysis – A Guide to Efficient Energy Use (ASME Press, New York, 1989).Google Scholar
Bejan, A., Advanced Engineering Thermodynamics (Wiley, New York, 1988).Google Scholar
Swaan Aarons, J., Kooi, H., and Sankaranarayanan, K., Efficiency and Sustainability in the Energy and Chemical Industries (Taylor & Francis, New York, 2004).Google Scholar
Gates, D. M., Energy and Ecology (Sinauer, Suderland, MA, 1985).Google Scholar
Smith, J. M., Ness, H. C., and Abbott, M. M., Introduction to Chemical Engineering Thermodynamics, 6th ed. (McGraw-Hill, New York, 2001).Google Scholar
Georgescu-Roegen, N., The Entropy Law and Economic Progress (Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA, 1971).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ayres, R. U., “Eco-thermodynamics: Economics and the Second Law,” Ecol. Econ. 26, 189–209 (1998).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Valero, A., Lozano, A. A., Serra, L., and Torres, C., “Application of the exergetic cost theory to the CGAM problem,” Energy 19, 365–381 (1994).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tsataronis, G., “Strengths and limitations of exergy analysis,” in Thermodynamics Optimization of Complex Energy Systems, edited by A. Bejan and E. Mamut (Kluwer, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, 1998), pp. 93–100.Google Scholar
Cleveland, C. J., Costanza, R., and Stern, D. I., editors, The Nature of Economics and the Economics of Nature (Elgar, Cheltenham, England, 2001).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ruth, M., Integrating Economics, Ecology and Thermodynamics (Springer, New York, 1993).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Müller, I., “Socio-thermodynamics – integration and segregation in a population,” Continuum Mech. Thermodyn. 14, 389–404 (2002).Google Scholar
Odum, H. T., Environmental Accounting: Emergy and Environmental Decision Making (Wiley, New York, 1996).Google Scholar
Odum, H. T. and Odum, E. C., Energy Basis for Man and Nature (McGraw-Hill, New York, 1976).Google Scholar
Penrose, R., “Singularities and time-asymmetry,” in General Relativity: An Einstein Centenary Survey, edited by Hawking, S. W. and Israel, W. (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1979), pp. 581–638.Google Scholar
Gyftopoulos, E. P., “Thermodynamics: Generalized available energy and availability or exergy,” Chap. 1 of this book.
Gyftopoulos, E. P. and Beretta, G. P., Thermodynamics: Foundations and Applications (Macmillan, New York, 1991).Google Scholar
Spreng, D. T., Net-Energy Analysis and the Energy Requirements of Energy Systems (Praeger, New York, 1988).Google Scholar
Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed. (Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1999).
Bakshi, B. R., Baral, A., and Hau, J. L., “Accounting for resource use by thermodynamics,” Chap. 3 of this book.

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×