GGR 333 – Energy and Society – Lectures (Part 2)

Lecture 1 (Sept. 13): Introduction
Lecture 2 (Sept. 20): Concepts and the Big Picture
Lecture 3 (Sept. 27): Carbon-Fuelled Civilizations 1
Lecture 4 (Oct. 4): Carbon-Fuelled Civilizations 2
No class (Oct. 11): Reading Week
Lecture 5 (Oct. 18): Carbon-Fuelled Civilizations 3
Lecture 6 (Oct. 25): Carbon-Fuelled Civilizations 4
Lecture 7 (Nov. 1): Electricity 1
Lecture 8 (Nov. 8): Electricity 2
Lecture 9 (Nov. 15): Electricity 3
Lecture 10 (Nov. 22): The Perennial Energy Debate
Lecture 11 (Nov. 29): The Curse of Natural Resources and Energy Security
Lecture 12 (Dec. 6): The Future of the Automobile

Themes and documentation for the term test and final exam

1. Bioenergy (wood pellets)
2. Germany’s Energiewende

REQUIRED VIDEOS

Electricity 101
CHMnanoed. 2010. “Magnetism: Motors and Generators.”

Enerdynamics. 2012. “Direct and Alternating Current.”

Student Energy
– Electricity 101
– Hydropower 101
– Electrical Grid 101

Andy Dunau. 2009. “How Wind Turbines Generate Electricity.”

Historical Perspective
“The Current War (trailer)“.

General Electric Company. 1915. The Home Electrical.

Buyout Footage Historic Film Archive. (Undated). HD Historic Stock Footage – Farm Family Life Without Electricity.

HBO Chernobyl (2019) TV Series official trailer.

Renewable Energy
Renewable Energy 101
Student Energy
– Renewable energy 101
– Wind power 101
– Solar 101
– Tidal power 101
– Biomass 101
– Geothermal 101
– Energy storage 101

Gates, Bill. 2018. “Climate Change and the 75% Problem.” GatesNotes (October 17).

Controversies (overview)
TEDx Talks. 2019. “Why renewables can’t save the planet | Michael Shellenberger” (January 9).

Prager University. 2015. “Can We Rely on Wind and Solar Energy?” (Alex Epstein).

Manhattan Institute. 2011. “Andrew Klavan: The Green Jobs Answer Man.”

What’s Wrong with Wind and Solar? | PragerU (Mark Mills, 2020).

Wind
Shahan, Zachary. 2014. “History of Wind Turbines.” Renewable Energy World (November 21).

Fields, Marty. Undated. “Clean, Safe, Reliable Wind Energy. Umm….“

M4GW. 2015. “Where Have All the Eagles Gone?“

Quantum Tech HD. 2020. Wind turbine installation from scratch.

DW Planet A. 2021. “Is Offshore Wind the Energy of the Future?” (September 24).

Twenty-One (21) Wind Turbines – Controlled Demolition, Inc. (wind turbines demolition).

Solar
Startup Selfie. 2018. “Large Solar Farm Cleaning.”

Biomass (Ethanol and Wood Chips)
Ask this Old House. 2016. “How to Maintain your Snowblower.”

Channel 4 News. 2018. “Forest in the U.S. Cut Down and Burnt in UK Power Stations.”

Marlboro Productions. 2019. “BURNED: Are Trees the New Coal?” (Trailer; A 30 minute summary of the movie is available here).

REQUIRED READINGS

Lecture 7

• General
Harvey, Fiona and Jennifer Rankin. 2022. “Risk of ‘conflict and strife’ in Europe over energy crisis, EU deputy warns.” The Guardian (July 8).

Jean, Daisy. 2020. “Living Off-Grid Seemed Like Fun Until I Tried it. We emerged like miners rescued from the dark pits of the earth and vowed: never again.” Vice (January 7).

“Electrification.” Greatest Engineering Achievements of the 20th Century. National Academy of Engineering. 2000.

Bradley, Robert L and Richard W. Fulmer. Energy: The Master Resource, Kendall Hunt Publishing Company, 2004, Chapter 2: Using Energy, pp. 19-20, 25-29, 30-31, 45-48.

EIA. 2015. “EIA’s Mapping System Highlights Energy Infrastructure across the United States.” Today in Energy (June 16).

Ritchie, Hannah and Max Roser. 2020. “Energy Production & Changing Energy Sources.” Our World in Data (Read the following)
– Access to Electricity
– Per Capita Electricity Consumption

Driscoll, Ed. 2011. “Earth Hour: Why I Will Leave My Lights On.” PJ Media (March 26).

Smil, Vaclav. 2021. “Supersizing the Grid.” IEEE Spectrum (April):18-10. 

• Hydroelectric
-Water power before electricity
Bryce, Robert. 2016. “Fossilized Thinking [Review of Fossil Capital: The Rise of Steam Power and the Roots of Global Warming, by Andreas Malm (Verso)].” City Journal (Winter).

Resolute Reader. 2015. “Review of Fossil Capital: The Rise of Steam Power and the Roots of Global Warming, by Andreas Malm (Verso).” (December 16).

Parks Canada. 2019. Lachine Canal National Historical Site: A supplier of hydraulic power.

-Hydroelectric Power
International Hydropower Association
– “A Brief History of Hydropower“
– “Types of Hydropower“

The Canadian Encyclopedia
– Hydroelectricity in Canada

Office of Energy Efficiency & Renewable Energy. 2017. “4 Reasons Why Hydropower is the Guardian of the Grid.”

• Nuclear
– Historical Perspective
Visual Capitalist

• Bhutada, Govind. 2022. Visualizing Nuclear Power Production by Country (January 17)
• Conte, Niccolo. 2021. The Power of a Uranium Pellet (August 27)
• Sponsored Content. 2021. The Advantages of Nuclear Energy in the Clean Energy Shift
• Desjardins, Jeff. 2018. The Safest Source of Energy Will Surprise You (May 18)

Pielke, Roger Jr. 2019. “Net-Zero Carbon Dioxide Emissions By 2050 Requires A New Nuclear Power Plant Every Day.” Forbes (September 30).

The Canadian Encyclopedia
– “Nuclear Energy“
– “Nuclear Power Plants“
– “Nuclear Research Establishments“

Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission – Nuclear Power Plants.

Ontario Power Generation. 2021. “Canada’s first Small Modular Reactor project reaches significant milestone.”

Smil, Vaclav. 2016. “Nuclear Electricity: A Successful Failure.” IEEE Spectrum (October): 24.

Shellenberger, Michael. 2019. “Why We Should Embrace Our Age of Nuclear.” Quillette (May 24).

– Overview
American Nuclear Association (ANS). “Myths about Nuclear Energy.”

Larsen, Todd. 2020. “Nuclear Energy is not a Climate Solution.” New Labor Forum 29 (3): 19-23.

Barnard, Christophe. 2019. “Dire Threat, Why Is No One Talking about Nuclear Power?” Fee.org (April 29).

Patel, Sonal. 2019. “Flexible Operation of Nuclear Power Plants Ramps Up.” Power (April 1).

Lecture 8

• Alternatives and Biomass
– History
Lacey, Stephen. 2014. “Google Engineers Explain Why They Stopped R&D in Renewable Energy. This realization was frankly shocking.” Greentech Media (November 19).

Stephens, W. R. “Review of Powering the Dream: The History and Promise of Green Technology by Alexis Madrigal (De Capo Press, 2011).” New York Journal of Books.

Shellenberger, Michael. 2018. “We Don’t Need Solar And Wind To Save The Climate — And It’s A Good Thing, Too.” Forbes (May 8).

“Oil vs Ethanol.” Wessels Living History Farm.

– Overview
“Renewable and Alternative Fuels Basics 101.” Energy Information Administration (read only the general definition).

BP. 2021. Statistical Review of World Energy – Renewable Energy.

Ritchie, Hannah and Max Roser. 2020. “Renewables.” OurWorldInData.org (Browse).

Foss, Michelle Michot. 2021. “How Fossil Fuels, Ironically, Are Critical in The Development of Renewable Energy Sources.” Forbes (February 8).

Smil, Vaclav. 2015. “Energy Transitions, Renewables and Rational Energy Use: A Reality Check.” OECD Observer (304) (November) : 36-37.

Smil, Vaclav. 2014. “How Green is Europe?” The American (September 30).

– Canada
Natural Resources Canada. “Renewable Energy Facts.”

Canadian Renewable Energy Association. CanREA’s 2050 Vision.

Morgan, Gwyn. 2020. “The Economics of Green Energy Ideology.” C2C (October 24).

– Supporters
IEA. 2021. Pathway to Critical and Formidable Goal of Net-zero Emissions by 2050 is Narrow but Brings Huge Benefits, According to IEA Special Report (May 18).

Staedter, Tracey. 2017. “How 139 Countries Could Be Powered by 100% Renewable Energy by 2050.” Live Science (September 20).

Roberts, David. 2019. “The Green New Deal, Explained. An insurgent movement is pushing Democrats to back an ambitious climate change solution.” Vox (January 7).

– Critics
+ Overview
Shellenberger, Michael. 2019. “Why Renewables Can’t Save the Planet.” Quillette (February 27).

Mills, Mark. 2019. “Inconvenient Energy Realities.” Energy 21 (July 1).

Ridley, Matt. 2017. “Wind Turbines are Neither Clean nor Green and they Provide Zero Global Energy.” The Spectator (May 13).

Miltimore, Jon. 2022. “US Faces Electricity Shortages Heading Into Summer, as Grid Operators Warn of Limits of Green Energy. Evidence shows America’s power grid is increasingly unreliable and struggling to keep up with energy demand.” Fee.org (May 10).

+ Output and Storage, Technical Issues

-Power density
Smil, Vaclav. 2010. “Power Density Primer: Understanding the Spatial Dimension of the Unfolding Transition to Renewable Electricity Generation (Part I – Definitions).” Master Resource (May 8).

Hayward, Steven. 2017. “A Visual Lesson in Energy Density.” PowerLine Blog (November 27).

–Size
Sneed, Annie. 2017. “World’s Largest Wind Turbine Would Be Taller Than the Empire State Building. Massive, flexible blades would bend with storm winds like the palm trees that inspired them.” Scientific American (June 26).

–Storage
Patel, Prachi. 2019. “How Inexpensive Must Energy Storage Be for Utilities to Switch to 100 Percent Renewables? MIT researchers list the energy storage technologies that could enable a 100 percent renewable grid.” IEEE Spectrum (September 16).

Temple, James. 2018. “The $2.5 Trillion Reason We Can’t Rely on Batteries to Clean up the Grid.” MIT Technology Review.

Mills, Mark P. 2021. “Transition to Nowhere. California’s switch to a primarily solar and wind-powered grid is a dead end.” City Journal (October 20).

Neely, Christopher. 2021. “The world’s largest battery facility has gone dormant in Moss Landing, with no timetable on return.” Monterey County Now (September 16).

+ Environmental Impact
US Department of Energy. 2022. Solar Energy Technologies Office Photovoltaics End-of-Life Action Plan. (March) (read Executive Summary).

O’Donoghue, Amy Joy. 2021. “The Dark Side of ‘Green Energy’ and Its Threat to the Nation’s Environment. What happens to old solar panels, windmills and high tech batteries?” Deseret News (January 30).

Institute for Energy Research. 2021. Green Technologies Cause Massive Waste and Pollution – IER (July 22).

Bryce, Robert. 2018. “The Antithesis of Green.” National Review (January 9).

+ Costs and Profitability

• Alternatives are cheaper

Roser, Max. 2020. « Why did renewables become so cheap so fast?” Our World in Data.

Holmes, Bob. 2020. “Q&A – Energy economist Faaiqa Hartley : Why green energy finally makes economic sense. Solar and wind generators have suddenly become just as cheap as other ways to produce electric power.” Knowable (January 14).

• Alternatives are more expensive

Wojick, David. 2021. “Why “cheap” solar increases the price of power.” CFACT.org (March 3, 2022).

Simmons, Randy. 2015. “What’s the True Cost of Wind Power?” Newsweek (April 15).

Van Doren, Peter. 2018. “Is Green Energy Competitive?” Cato at Liberty (July 24).

Shellenberger, Michael. 2018. “Yes, Solar And Wind Really Do Increase Electricity Prices – And For Inherently Physical Reasons.” Forbes (April 25).

Lomborg, Bjorn. 2016. “Are Wind and Solar Energy already Competitive with Fossil Fuels?” LinkedIn (January 27).

• Biomass
– Overview
Ridley, Matt. 2011. “Bioenergy versus the Planet.” The Rational Optimist (December 15).

– Wood
Helmer, Jodi. 2022. “As Europe and the United States look to cut their carbon emissions, the biomass industry wants us to pretend that logging forests in the American South could help.” NRDC (March 28).

Grunwald, Michael. 2021. “The ‘Green Energy’ That Might Be Ruining the Planet. The biomass industry is warming up the South’s economy, but many experts worry it’s doing the same to the climate. Will the Biden Administration embrace it, or cut it loose?” Politico (March 26).

Livermore, Martin. 2019. Burnt Offering. The Biomess of Biomass. GWPF Report 37 (Read the Executive Summary).

Strain, Daniel. 2018. “Think Wood is a Greener Source of Energy than Coal? Think again.” Anthropocene (February 5).

– Ethanol and Biodiesel
Suncor – Renewable Fuels

Bovard, James. 2021. “Federal Farm Policy Is Corrupt Regardless of the Latest Uproar.” AIER (July 1).

Runge, C. Ford. 2016. “The Case Against More Ethanol: It’s Simply Bad for Environment.” Yale Environment 360 (May 25).

Auld, Douglas and Ross McKitrick. 2014. “Money to Burn: Assessing the Costs and Benefits of Canada’s Strategy for Vehicle Biofuels.” McDonald-Laurier Institute (June) (Executive Summary).

Bader, Hans. 2018. “Biofuels Mandates ‘Unleashed a Catastrophe’ for our Planet.” Liberty Unyielding (November 25).

Lecture 9

• Wind
– Overview
Visual Capitalist

• Bhutada, Govind. 2022. What Are the Five Major Types of Renewable Energy? (June 8)
• Venditti, Bruno. 2022. Mapped: Solar and Wind Power by Country (May 4)
• LePan, Nicholas. 2021. Rare Earth Elements: Where in the World Are They? (November 22)
• Bhutada, Govind. 2021. The Raw Material Needs of Energy Technologies (June 10)
• Desjardins, Jeff. 2018. The Raw Materials that Fuel the Green Revolution (January 10)

– Historical Perspective
Anonymous. 2018. “It’s Windmill Weekend: 10 things you should know about Dutch windmills.” Dutch News (May 9).

Lord Kelvin (William Thomson). 1902. “Windmills Must Be the Future Source of Power.” Philadelphia North American (May 18).

Bradley Jr., Robert L. 2020. “The Siren Song of Wind Power: Impending Competitiveness.” IER (August 5).

+ Overview and technical issues
Smil, Vaclav. 2019. “Wind turbines: how big?” IEEE Spectrum (November): 20.

Smil, Vaclav. 2016. “What I See when I see a Wind Turbine.” IEEE Spectrum (March): 27.

+ Canada
Canadian Encyclopedia “Wind Energy.”

CANWEA. “Installed Capacity.”

+ Supporters
Nelsen, Arthur. 2015. “Wind Power Generates 140% of Denmark’s Electricity Demand.” The Guardian (July 10).

Dinerstein, Chuck. 2021. “Blowin’ in the Wind: Wind Energy Comes at a Cost.” ACSH (June 9).

+ Critics
Schleede, Glenn (Guest Blogger). 2010. “Understanding the Limits of Wind Power: Key Industry Terms.” MasterResource – A free-market energy blog, March 14.

Orr, Isaac. “Wind Turbines Don’t Even Last 20 Years.” Center for the American Experiment (February 10).

Droz, Jr. John. 2018. “Twenty-Five Industrial Wind Energy Deceptions.” Master Resource (September 4).

Gosselin, P. 2018. “Germany’s “Ticking Time Bombs”.Technical Experts Say Wind Turbines Posing “Significant Danger” To Environment!” No Tricks Zone (June 22).

• Solar
Visual Capitalist

• Bhutada, Govind. 2021. Mapped: Solar Power by Country in 2021 (November 15)
• Desjardins, Jeff. 2021. The Exponential View of Solar Energy (June 25)
• Venditti, Bruno. 2021. How Much Land is Needed to Power the U.S. with Solar? (August 11)
• Wallach, Omri. 2022. The Solar Power Duck Curve Explained (April 4)

Coggins, James. 2019. “Is Residential Solar Energy Cost Effective?” C2C (October 20).

Shellenberger, Michael. 2021. “Why Everything They Said About Solar Was Wrong. Solar Panels Will Create 50 Times More Waste & Cost 4 Times More Than Predicted, New Harvard Business Review Study Finds.” (June 21).

Jackson, Fiona. 2022. “Solar panels are LESS efficient in high temperatures despite increased sunlight, expert warns – as UK heatwave sparks a FIRE at a solar farm in Dorset.” Daily Mail (July 12).

• Tidal Power
Lehigh University. “Brief History of Tidal Energy.”

Levitan, Dave. 2014. “Why Wave Power Has Lagged Far Behind as Energy Source.” Yale Environmennt 360 (April 28).

SUGGESTED READINGS

• Conventional Electricity Production
Overview and debates
On Wikipedia
Electric potential energy
Power station
Base load power plant
Peaking power plant

Classic Works
Wayland, Francis. 1870/1838. Elements of Political Economy. Gould and Lincoln, Part II: The Modes by Which the Productiveness of Human Industry May be Increased, Section 1: On the Use of Natural Agents pp. 60-74.

Jevons, William Stanley. 1866/1865. The Coal Question; An Inquiry concerning the Progress of the Nation, and the Probable Exhaustion of our Coal-Mines. MacMillan and Co., Chapter 8: Of Supposed Substitutes for Coal.

Abbot, C. G. 1929. The Sun and the Welfare of Man. Smithsonian Institution Series (Chapter 9: Harnessing the Sun).

Historical discussions (general)

• Biomass (long view)

Dartnell, Lewis. 2015. “Out of the Ashes. It took a lot of fossil fuels to forge our industrial world. Now they’re almost gone. Could we do it again without them?” Aeon (13 April).

• Electricity (development)

Krider, E. Philip. 2006. “Benjamin Franklin and Lightning Rods.” Physics Today Online (January).

Alfred, Randy. 2008. “Oct. 21, 1879: Edison Gets the Bright Light Right.” Wired, October 21.

Alfred, Randy. 2008. “Sept. 22, 1791: Faraday Enters a World He Will Change.” Wired, September 22.

• Grid and Regulatory Framework
Niles, Raymond C. 2008. “Property Rights and the Crisis of the Electric Grid.” The Objective Standard (May 20).

Munson, Richard. “Yes, in My Backyard: Distributed Electric Power.” Issues in Science and Technology, vol 22, no 2, Winter 2006.

• Hydro

• History (General)

Before electricity
History Cooperative. “Navigation and Waterpower: Adaptation and Technology on Canadian Canals.”

“Waterpower, the Lachine Canal, and the Industrial Development of Montreal.” 2003. Special issue of IA. The Journal of the Society for Industrial Archeology 29 (1)

White Coal
Landry, Marc. “Water as White Coal.” In: “On Water: Perceptions, Politics, Perils,” edited by Agnes Kneitz and Marc Landry, RCC Perspectives 2012, no. 2, 7– 11.

Veyret, Paul. 1970. « Cent ans de Houille Blanche. Cent ans d’Economie Alpestre. »

Revue de Géographie Alpine 58 (1) : 5-49

USA
We Energies News. 2013. “Vulcan Street Plant became first hydroelectric central station on Sept. 30, 1882.” (September 30)

Historical Marker Database (USA) Vulcan Street Plant Replica Historical Marker

Niagara Power Houses (edisontechcenter.org)

• Canada / Ontario

Canada
“The Origin of Hydroelectric Production in Canada.” In The History of Hydroelectricity in Quebec

Kirby, Jessica. 2015. “Top 10 hydroelectric dams in Canada. These dams help make Canada a hydro superpower.” Canadian Mining and Energy (October 27).

World Atlas. The Largest Hydroelectric Power Stations in Canada

“About Hydroelectric Energy.” Natural Resources Canada.

Ontario
Power at Niagara (nflibrary.ca)

Marsh, James M. 2015. “Adam Beck and the Creation of Ontario Hydro.” Canadian Encyclopedia

Wikipedia – Sir Adam Beck Hydroelectric Generating Stations

Hydro Hawkesbury – Electricity 101 (including historical timeline of power generation in Ontario)

Quebec
Zaruba, Antonin. 2021. “Development of the Sault Montmorency Falls.” Canadian Dam Bulletin 32 (1)

Digital Museums of Canada. Shawinigan – The City of Hydroelectricity

Wikipedia. James Bay Project

• Contemporary issues

EIA. 2016. “The world’s nine largest operating power plants are hydroelectric facilities.” Today in Energy (October 18).

“Hydropower and the World’s Energy Future – The Role of Hydropower in Bringing Clean, Renewable, Energy to the World.” International Hydropower Association Compton, West Sussex, United Kingdom, International Commission on Large Dams, Paris, France, Implementing Agreement on Hydropower Technologies and Programmes / International Energy Agency, Paris, France, Canadian Hydropower Association Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. November 2000.

• Nuclear

• Overview

IEA. 2021. Tracking Progress: Nuclear Power

World Energy Council. 2019. The Future of Nuclear: Diverse Harmonies in the Energy Transitions.

• Economic and Policy issues

GWPF. 2018. “Who Killed The Small Modular Nuclear Programme?” (September 2018).

Cohen, Bernard L. 1990. The Nuclear Energy Option. Plenum Press. Chapter 9: Costs of Nuclear Power Plants – What went wrong?

• Technical issues

The ABC’s of nuclear science

The BBC’s guide to nuclear power

UNSCEAR – United Nations Scientific Committee On The Effects Of Atomic Radiation

Radwaste.org – A guide to radioactive waste resources on the Internet.

Union of Concerned Scientists. Nuclear Power.

• Canada

Exner-Pirot, Heather. 2022. “The nuclear renaissance is an opportunity for Canada. Will we seize it?” Ottawa Citizen (April 26).

McClearn, Matthew. 2021. “Canada’s first new nuclear reactor in decades is an American design. Will it prompt a rethink of government support?” Globe & Mail (December 26).

“UK Nuclear Power: The Contenders.” BBC News, July 10, 2006.

A Survey Article on “Nuclear Power – Overcoming Its Image Problem.” Journal of Energy Literature 10 (1): 37-44. 2004.

Bailey, Ronald. 2005. “Nuclear Explosion at Montreal.” Tech Central Station, December 9.

Deutsch, John and Ernest Monitz. 2003. The Future of Nuclear Power, MIT Interdicisplinary Studies.

Beck, Peter W. 1999. “Nuclear Energy in the Twenty-First Century: Examination of a Contentious Subject.” Annual Review of Energy and Environment 24: 113-137.

Environmental Progress. 2017. The Power to Decarbonize.

Huber, Peter W., and Mark P. Mills, Winter 2005. “Why the U.S. Needs More Nuclear Power.” City Journal.

Gabbard, Alex. “Coal Combustion: Nuclear Resource or Danger.” Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

Kazimi, Mujid S. and Neil E. Todreas. 1999. “Nuclear Power Economic Performance: Challenges and Opportunities.” Annual Review of Energy and Environment 24: 139-171.

Lester, Richard K. “New Nukes.” Issues in Science and Technology, vol 22, no 4, Summer 2006.

Lorenzi, Paul. “A Second Look at Nuclear Power.” Issues in Science and Technology, vol 21, no 3, Spring 2005.

MacFarlane, Allison. 2001. “Interim Storage of Spent Fuel in the United States.” Annual Review of Energy and the Environment 26: 201-235.

“Frequently asked questions about nuclear energy” on John McCarthy’s Progress and Its Sustainability Website.

Murphy, Francois. 2005. “Chernobyl radiation death toll 56 so far – U.N.” Yahoo! News, September 5.

Nolan, Peter. 2005. “Energy in the UK.” TCS Daily, December 19.

Peterson, Per F., William E. Kastenberg & Michael Corradini “Nuclear Waste and the Distant Future.” Issues in Science and Technology, vol 22, no 4, Summer 2006.

Portney, Paul R. “Nuclear Power: Clean, Costly, and Controversial.” Resources (Navigating Energy Choices in the 21st Century), Winter 2005, Issue 156, pp. 28-30.

Reynolds, Glenn Harlan. 2006. “No Nukes Is Good Nukes?” Tech Central Station, February 8.

Richel, Theo. 2005. “Deadly Assumptions: Radiation and Risk.” Tech Central Station, September 28.

Rummery, T.E., and J.A. Macpherson. “Canada’s Nuclear Achievement: Technical and Economic Perspectives.”

Talbot, David. 2005. “Nuclear Powers Up.” TechnologyReview.com, September.

Taylor, Jerry, and Peter Van Doren. 2007. “Hooked on Subsidies.” Forbes, November 26.

“Understanding Radiation.” Nuclear Engineering, U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Nuclear Energy, Science & Technology, DOE/NE-0074.

“The Chernobyl Catastrophe – Consequences on Human Health.” Greenpeace, April 2006.

• Alternatives and Biomass
• General
– Substantial pieces
Overview
Pimentel, David, Megan Herz, Michelle Glickstein, Mathew Zimmerman, et al. 2002. “Renewable Energy: Current and Potential issues.” Bioscience 52(12): 1111-1121.

Anderson, Dennis. 1997. “Renewable Energy Technology and Policy for Development,” Annual Review of Energy and the Environment 22: 187-215.

Bradley, Robert L and Richard W. Fulmer. Energy: The Master Resource, Kendall Hunt Publishing Company, 2004, Chapter 2: Using Energy, pp. 33-36, 39-43, 56-61.

Metcalf, Gilbert E. 2008. “Using Tax Expenditures to Achieve Energy Policy Goals.” NBER Working Paper No. 13753, January.

Controversies (general)
Land requirements
Bryce, Robert. 2022. “Washington Post and NPR Ignore the Rural Backlash Against Renewables.” Quillette (March 7)

Bryce, Robert. 2021. Not in our Backyard. Rural America is fighting back against large-scale renewable energy projects. Center of the American Experiment

Mineral requirements
MIT Climate Portal
– Mining and Metals

World Bank. 2017 The Growing Role of Minerals and Metals for a Low Carbon Future Working Paper 117581

Jones, Nicola. 2013. “A Scarcity of Rare Metals is Hindering Green Technologies.” Yale Environment 360 (November 18)

Carbon neutrality
MIT Climate Portal

• Does the concrete needed to build renewable energy cancel out the benefits?

Subsidies
Zycher, Benjamin. 2017. “Wasteful Subsidies for Me and Thee, Not for That Fossil Guy Behind the Tree.” Washington Examiner (August 3).

Historical Perspective
Bradley, Robert. 2018. The Economic Fall and Political Rise of Renewable Energy. Texas Policy Foundation

Hearfield, John. 2007. Windmill Sails.

Soft Path
Wikipedia – Soft Energy Path

Lovins, Amory B. 1976. “Energy Strategy: The Road Not Taken?” Foreign Affairs (October)

Lovins, Amory B. 2016. “Soft Energy Paths. Lessons of the First 40 Years.” Medium (August 19)

Smil, Vaclav. 2000. “Rocky Mountain Visions: A Review Essay.” Population and Development Review 26 (1): 163-176

Canada
Smart Prosperity Institute. 2021. Solar and Wind Energy in Canada. Value Recovery and End-of-life Considerations (October).

Supporters
Hutson, Matthew. 2022. “The Renewable-Energy Revolution Will Need Renewable Storage. Can gravity, pressure, and other elemental forces save us from becoming a battery-powered civilization?” New Yorker (April 18).

Mandel, Kyla. 2015. “Here’s How Canada Could Have 100% Renewable Electricity by 2035.” The Narwhal (March 26).

Arndt, Channing, Doug Arent, Faaiqa Hartley, Bruno Merven, and Alam Hossain Mondal. 2019. “Faster Than You Think: Renewable Energy and Developing Countries.” Annual Review of Resource Economics 11: 149-168.

Neville, Kate J., Jennifer Baka, Shanti Gamper-Rabindran, Karen Bakker, Stefan Andreasson, Avner Vengosh, Alvin Lin, Jewellord Nem Singh, Erika Weinthal. 2017. “Debating Unconventional Energy: Social, Political, and Economic Implications.” Annual Review of Environment and Resources 42: 241-266.

United Nations Environment Programme. 2008. Green Jobs: Towards Decent Work in a Sustainable, Low-Carbon World. UNEP.

Clougherty, Tom (Editor). 2007. “Positive Environmentalism – A Convenient Truth.” Globalisation Institute.

Mohiuddin, Shamarukh. 2004. “How America Lost Its Clean Technology Edge.” Progressive Policy Institute, December 1st.

Sayigh, Ali. 1999. “Renewable Energy – The Way Forward.” Applied Energy 64 (1-4): 15-30.

Hezri, Adnan A. and Wilhelm Hofmeister (eds). 2012. Towards a Green Economy. In Search of Sustainable Energy Policies for the Future. Konrad Adenauer Stiftung.

Critics
Conley, Mike and Tim Maloney. 2018. Roadmap to Nowhere. The Myth of Powering the Nation with Renewable Energy. (A commentary on the 2015 landmark paper: 100% Clean and Renewable Wind, Water, and Sunlight (WWS) All-sector Energy Roadmaps for the 50 United States by Mark Jacobson, Mark Delucchi, et al.) (Shorter discussion in Conca, James. 2017. “Stanford’s 100% Renewables A Roadmap To Nowhere.” Forbes (December 12).

Aris, Capell. 2018. A Cheaper, Cleaner Electricity System. Global Warming Policy Foundation (Read the Foreword and Summary).

Zycher, Benjamin. 2016. “Four Decades of Subsidy Rationales for Uncompetitive Energy.” Statement before the U.S. Senate Committee on Finance Hearing on Energy Tax Policy in 2016 and Beyond. June 14 (American Enterprise Institute).

Hughes, Gordon. 2011. The Myth of Green Jobs. Global Warming PolicyFoundation.

Ausubel, Jesse H. 2007. “Renewable and Nuclear Heresies.” International Journal of Nuclear Governance, Economy and Ecology, Vol. 1, No.3.

Taylor, Jerry and Peter VanDoren. 2002. Evaluating the Case for Renewable Energy: Is Government Support Warranted? Policy Analysis No. 422. Washington: Cato Institute.

McVeigh, James, Dallas Burtraw, Joel Darmstadter and Karen Palmer. 1999. “Winner, Loser, or Innocent Victim? Has Renewable Energy Performed As Expected?” Discussion Paper 99-28, Washington: Resources for the Future.

Bradley. Robert L. 1997. “Renewable Energy: Not Cheap, Not ‘Green’,” Cato Policy Analysis No. 280.

Stop These Things. 2022. “Diesel Driven: World’s First “Net-Zero” Wind Power/Pumped Hydro System A Dismal Failure.” (April 17).

Tverberg, Gail. 2022. “Limits to Green Energy Are Becoming Much Clearer.” Our Finite World (February 9).

Greenstone, Michael and Nath, Ishan. 2020. “Do Renewable Portfolio Standards Deliver Cost-Effective Carbon Abatement?” University of Chicago, Becker Friedman Institute for Economics Working Paper No. 2019-62.

Zycher, Benjamin. 2017. “The High Cost of Unreliable Power.”  AEI.org (August 7).

– Shorter pieces
Anderson, William L. 2003. “Energy Bills and Central Planning,” Mises.org, December 16.

Bairstow, Jonny. 2018. “Quarter of businesses say renewables are a passing fad. The financial services sector is particularly dubious, with 40% doubting clean power is here to stay.” Energy Live News (August 14).

Benjamin Zycher, Benjamin. 2017. “The high cost of unreliable power. Wind and solar power subsidies put dependable energy at a disadvantage.” Washington Times (August 7).

Bryce, Robert. 2018. “California Climate Policies Facing Revolt from Civil-Rights Groups.” National Review (September 15).

Bryce, Robert. 2010. “Five myths about green energy.” The Washington Post, April 25.

Bullis, Kevin. 2011. “Venture Capitalists Back Away from Clean Energy.” Technology Review, August 11.

Darmstadter, Joel and Karen Palmer. “Renewable Sources of Electricity: Safe Bet or Tilting at Windmills?” Resources (Navigating Energy Choices in the 21st Century), Winter 2005, Issue 156, pp. 24-27.

Delingpole, James. 2011. “Green Jobs? Wot Green Jobs (pt 242).” The Telegraph (September 2).

“Energy Fact Sheet – Appropriate Technology.” State the Essence!

Forbes, Viv. 2013. “Parasitic Power Producers.” American Thinker (August 19).

Gosselin, P. 2018. “Green Energy Revolution A Flop: Fossil Fuels’ Share Of Total Energy Use Unchanged in 40 Years!” No Tricks Zone (January 12).

Innis, Roy. 2007. “The Truth About ‘Alternative Energy’.” Townhall.com, December 5.

Kapitza, Bryan. 2016. “Central planning and energy alternatives.” Rebel Media (May 27).

Lomborg, Bjorn. 2013. “The Decline of Renewable Energy.” Project Syndicate (August 14).

Love, Shannon. 2010. “Why Alternative Power Is and Will Remain Useless.” Chicago Boyz, February 28th.

Michaels, Robert J. 2005. “An Ill Wind for Consumers: The Energy Bill.” NCPA Brief Analysis No. 522, July 26.

Mouawad, Jad. 2009. “Oil Giants Loath to Follow Obama’s Green Lead.” NYTimes.com, April 7.

Pearce, Fred. 2008. “The Great Green Electricity Con.” Guardian.co.uk, October 23.

Ridley, Matt. 2017. “The green movement has broken in two: what happens next?” Reaction (November 7).

Roberts, David. 2018. “Batteries Have a Dirty Secret. Energy storage is considered a green technology. But it actually increases carbon emissions.” Vox (July 21).

Smil, Vaclav. 2017. “Grid Electricity Storage: Size Matters.” IEEE Spectrum (February).

Smil, Vaclav. “21St Century Energy – Some Sobering Thoughts.” OECD Observer No. 258/59, December 2006.

Solomon, Lawrence. 2018. “Trudeau Stands Alone as Canada – and the World – Abandons Green Energy – World is Moving Off Wind and Solar.” Financial Post (September 28).

Taylor, Jerry. 2006. “For Now, Gasoline Is Our Only Cheap Fuel.” Cato Institute, May 12.

Tanton, Thomas. 2004. “A Whirlwind of Troubles – Environmental, Operational, and Financial Problems.” PERC Reports, September.

Wilson, Peter. 2013. “The Dream of a World Without Oil.” American Thinker, March 25.

Worrall, Eric. 2017. “British Foreign Aid Scandal: “Hundreds of Millions” Wasted on Useless Renewable Projects.” WUWT (March 12).

• Alternatives and Biomass
– Supporters
Mazzucato, Mariana. 2015. “Toward a Green New Deal.” Project Syndicate (December 15).

Browne, John. 2018. “Oil and Gas Companies Will Lead the Energy Revolution. The ‘supermajors’ are already investing in a low-carbon future.” Bloomberg (July 11).

Finkel, Alan. 2016. “Why $5 Trillion is my New Favourite Number. Relying on clean energy means we need a big investment in energy storage – but the numbers are daunting, writes Alan Finkel.” Cosmos (August 9).

– Critics
Mills, Mark P. 2020. Mines, Minerals, and “Green” Energy: A Reality Check. Manhattan Institute (July 9) (Read the executive summary).

Mills, Mark P. 2019. “The “New Energy Economy”: An Exercise in Magical Thinking.” Manhattan Institute (March 26) (Read the Executive Summary).

Hickel, Jason. 2019. “The Limits of Clean Energy. If the world isn’t careful, renewable energy could become as destructive as fossil fuels.” Foreign Policy (September 6).

2014. “Analysis: Solar & Wind Power Costs are Huge Compared to Natural Gas Fired Generation.” Watts Up with That? (September 6).

Constable, John. 2018. “Renewables and Climate Policy are on a Collision Course.” GWPF Energy Comment (September 12).

• Topical Pieces
> Historical Perspective

Laird, Frank. N. 2003. “Constructing the Future – Advocating Energy Technologies in the Cold War.” Technology and Culture 44 (1): 27-49.

> Biomass
– Substantial pieces
Wood pellets into electricity

Helmer, Jodi. 2022. “No, Burning Wood Fuels Is Not Climate-Friendly. As Europe and the United States look to cut their carbon emissions, the biomass industry wants us to pretend that logging forests in the American South could help.” NRDC (March 28)

Buchholz, Thomas, John S. Gunn and Benktesh Sharma. 2021. “When Biomass Electricity Demand Prompts Thinnings in Southern US Pine Plantations: A Forest Sector Greenhouse Gas Emissions Case Study » Frontiers in Forests and Global Change 4: 642569

Brack, Duncan, Richard Birdsey and Wayne Walker. 2021. Greenhouse gas emissions from burning US-sourced woody biomass in the EU and UK. Chatham House (October)

Porsö, C., Hammar, T., Nilsson, D. et al. 2018. « Time-Dependent Climate Impact and Energy Efficiency of Internationally Traded Non-torrefied and Torrefied Wood Pellets from Logging Residues.” Bioenery. Research 11 : 139–151 (2018).

Pearce, Fred. 2017. “Carbon Loophole: Why Is Wood Burning Counted as Green Energy?” Yale 360 (December 19).

Boisvert, Will. 2014. “Harmonic Destruction. How Greens Justify Bioenergy’s Assault on Nature.” Breakthrough Journal 4 (Summer).

Ethanol and biodiesel

Doomberg. 2022. Diesel for Dinner (April 27)

Homewood, Paul. 2018. “Palm Oil Was Supposed to Help Save the Planet. Instead It Unleashed a Catastrophe.” Not a Lot of People Know That (November 22).

Rosegrant, Mark W. and Siwa Msangi. 2014. “Consensus and Contention in the Food-Versus-Fuel Debate.” Annual of Environment and Resources 39: 271-294.

Kiefer, T. A. “Ike.” 2013. “Energy Insecurity: The False Promise of Liquid Biofuels.” Strategic Studies Quarterly (Spring): 114-151 (Extended version available at Kiefer, T. A. “Ike.” 2013. Twenty-First Century Snake Oil. Why the United States Should Reject Biofuels as Part of a Rational National Security Energy Strategy Waterloo Institute for Complexity and Innovation (January), WICI Occasional Paper No. 4.

R. W. Howarth and S. Bringezu, editors. 2009. “Biofuels: Environmental Consequences and Interactions with Changing Land Use.” Proceedings of the Scientific Committee on Problems of the Environment (SCOPE), International Biofuels Project Rapid Assessment, 22-25 September 2008 Gummersbach, Germany.

Auld, Douglas. 2008. “The Ethanol Trap: Why Policies to Promote Ethanol as Fuel Need Rethinking.” C.D. Howe Institute Commentary, No. 268, July.

Green, Kenneth P. 2008. “Ethanol and the Environment.” American Enterprise Institute.

James, Sallie. 2008. “Food Fight.” Center for Trade Policy Studies, Free Trade Bulletin, No. 31, January 31.

Runge, C. Ford, and Benjamin Senauer. 2008. “How Ethanol Fuels the Food Crisis.” Foreign Affairs, May 28.

Zubrin, Robert. 2008 “In Defense of Biofuels.” The New Atlantis (Spring).

Taylor, Jerry, and Peter Van Doren. “The Ethanol Boondoggle.” The Milken Institute Review, First Quarter 2007.

Lave, Lester B., & W. Michael Griffin. “Import Ethanol, Not Oil.” Issues in Science and Technology, vol 22, no 3, Spring 2006.

Kheshgi, Haroon S., Roger C Prince and Gregg Marland. 2000. “The Potential of Biomass Fuels in the Context of Global Climate Change: Focus on Transportation Fuels,” Annual Review of Energy and the Environment 25: 199-244.

– Shorter pieces
Wood pellets into electricity

Guynup, Sharon. 2021. “COP26: Surging wood pellet industry threatens climate, say experts.” Mongabay (November 9)

Catanoso, Justin. 2021. “The science of forest biomass: Conflicting studies map the controversy.” Mongabay (July 12)

Wood Pellet Association of Canada. 2020. “Canada’s wood pellets: a responsible source of clean energy.” Biomass Magazine (July 15).

Lean, Geoffrey. 2015. “Are wood chips really worse than burning coal? Some campaigners believe that using apparently environmentally friendly wood can be three times worse for the climateWood chips vs coal.” Telegraph (February 14).

McClure, Robert. 2014. “Biomass Fuel: Worse for Climate than Coal? It depends. Do you mean now, or decades later? Part of a series.” The Tyee (April 23).

“U.S. Wood Pellet Exports Double in 2013 in Response to Growing European Demand.” Today in Energy (USA EIA) (May 22, 2014).

“Where are the Wood Pellets Going? A Look at Global Biomass Exports.” Woodpellets.com (December 1, 2014).

Warrick, Joby. 2015. “How Europe’s Climate Policies led to More U.S. Trees Being Cut Down.” Washington Post (June 2).

Ethanol and biodiesel

Campbell, Hank. 2018. “Ethanol Is Bad Science And Bad Policy.” American Council on Science and Health (October 26).

Eyermann, Craig. 2018. “Ethanol Is Terrible for Health and the Environment, but Government Keeps Backing It. The US federal government still strongly pushes corn- and soy-based ethanol despite the EPA’s new study showing its harmful effects FEE on ethanol.” Fee.org (August 19).

Mayer, Jared. 2016. “Politicians Love Burning Food For Fuel. An Interview with Robert Bryce.” Forbes (April 3).

DeCicco, John. 2016. “Biofuels turn out to be a climate mistake.” Energy Post EU (November 15).

Lewis, Marlo. 2015. “Food vs. Fuel: Worse than We Thought?” Global Warming Policy Foundation (January 30).

Aziz, John. 2013. “It’s Time for America to End Ethanol Subsidies.” The Week (July 31).

Purple, Matt. 2010. “Corny Capitalism.” The American Spectator, August 27.

“Editorial: Administration caves to Big Corn – EPA burns your money with ethanol.” The Washington Times, October 18, 2010.

Rohrlich, Justin. 2009. ” American’s Crazed Corn Habit.” Mises Institute, December 22.

Roger, Heather. 2009. “Why Biofuels Are the Rainforest’s Worst Enemy.” Mother Jones, March/April.

Chakrabortty, Aditya. 2008. “Secret Report: Biofuel Caused Food Crisis – Internal World Bank Study Delivers Blow to Plant Energy Drive.” The Guardian, July 4.

Chavez, Linda. 2008. “A Government Engineered Food Crisis.” Townhall.com, March 28.

Bailey, Ronald. 2008. “The Biggest Green Mistake – Biofuels and the Global Food Crisis. ” Reason Magazine, April 8.

Gorrie, Peter. 2008. “Biofuels not ‘Miracle’ Cure, Studies Say.” The Toronto Star, February 8.

Harrabin, Roger. 2007. “Biofuels Bonanza Facing ‘Crash’.” BBC News, November 15.

Gattuso, Dana Joel. 2007. “Corn Prices High as an Elephant’s Eye.” Townhall.com, November 29.

Kiesling, Lynne. 2007. “Proprietary, Sweeter Tomates: Another Unintended Consequence of Ethanol Subsidies.” Knowledge Problem, Oct. 2.

Brahic, Catherine. 2007. “Forget Biofuels – Burn Oil and Plant Forests Instead. ” NewScientist Environment, 16 August.

Bailey, Ronald. 2007. “Bioethanol Boondoggle – Political Viability is More Important than Commercial Viability. ” Reason Magazine, December 4.

Stossel, John. 2007. “The Many Myths of Ethanol.” Townhall.com, May 23.

Pasour Jr., Ernest C., Randal R. Rucker. 2007. “Big Ethanol Push in U.S. Is Pork Barrel Boondoggle.” The Independant Institute, July 14.

Llosa, Alvaro Vargas. 2007. “The Ethanol Alliance.” The Independent Institute, April 4.

Surowiecki, James. 2006. “Deal Sweeteners.” The New Yorker, November 27.

Lehr, Jay. 2006. “Are The Ethanol Wars Over?” Perc Reports.

Bailey, Ronald. 2006. “Alcohol Saves the Planet – The Future of Booze-Fueled Machines.” Reason Online, February 3.

Clayton, Mark. 2006. “Carbon Cloud Over a Green Fuel Byline.” The Christian Science Monitor, March 23.

Bast, Joseph L., Thomas Tanton, Jonathan Adler, Joel Schwartz, Roy Cordato, Fred L. Smith, Jr., David Hogberg, and Myron Ebell. 2006. “A Kernel of Support For Ethanol” Perc Reports.

Staniford, Stuart. 2006. “Life in a Grass House.” The Oil Drum, March 07.

“Quick guide: Biofuels.” BBC News, 24 January 2007.

Steil, Mark. 2005. “The Ethanol Equation.” Minnesota Public Radio, March 21.

Anderson, Peter. 2005. “Ethanol and the Calculation Issue.” Ludwig von Mises Institute, August 18.

Bailey, Ronald. 2003. “Congress Gets Drunk on Ethanol: Corn + your tax dollars = a bad improvement.” Reason Magazine, November 20.

> Wind
– Substantial pieces
Historical perspective

Wikipedia. History of Wind Power

DeDecker, Kris. 2021. “Wind Powered Factories: History (and future) of industrial windmills.” Low-Tech Magazine (October).

Contemporary issues

Espey, Molly and Eamon Espey. 2022. Using Markets to Limit Eagle Mortality from Wind Power. How a market in tradable permits can motivate the wind energy sector to conserve eagles (July 26).

Sander, Jon with Mitch Rolling and Isacc Orr. 2022. Big Blow: Offshore Wind Power’s Devastating Costs and Impacts on North Carolina. John Locke Foundation. (June).

Klem Jr., Daniel, Christopher J. Farmer, Nicole Delacretaz, Yigal Gelb, and Peter G. Saenger. 2009. “Architectural and Landscape Risk Factors Associated with Bird–glass Collisions in an Urban Environment.” The Wilson Journal of Ornithology 121(1):126-134.

Courtney, Richard S. 2006. “Wind Farms Provide Negligible Useful Electricity.” Center for Science and Public Policy, March.

McGowan, Jon G. and Stephen R. Connors. 2000. “Windpower: A Turn of the Century Review,” Annual Review of Energy and the Environment 25: 147-197.

– Shorter pieces
Supporters
Van Rooij, Rogier. 2016. “The Solutions Project: How 139 Countries Can Hit 100% Renewable Energy.” Clean Technica (January 23).

Carbon Brief. 2013. “Bird death and wind turbines: a look at the evidence.” (April 10).

Roney, J. Matthew. 2010. “Wind Power Soared Past 150,000 Megawatts in 2009.” Earth Policy Institute, March 30.

Cleveland, Cutler, Ida Kubiszewski and Peter K. Endres. 2006. “Energy Return on Investment (EROI) for Wind Energy.” Encyclopedia of Earth. Eds. Peter Saundry. (Washington, D. C.: Environmental Information Coalition, National Council for Science and the Environment). [First published October 13, 2006; Last revised October 16, 2006; Retrieved October 27, 2006].

Critics

Bradley, Robert. 2022. “Golden Eagles and Industrial Wind: Justice Served (cats, windows not applicable).” Master Resource (April 18).

Ridley, Matt. 2022. “Madness of our worship of wind: They despoil our glorious countryside, add £6 billion a year to our household bills and are arguably the most inefficient solution to our energy crisis. So why is the Government planning to make it even easier to build them?” Daily Mail (March 27).

Meigs, James B. 2022. “Food for the Table, Not for the Gas Tank. With prices skyrocketing, it’s time for Washington to suspend—and ultimately repeal—the Renewable Fuel Standard.” City Journal (March 14).

Harmsen, Nick. 2021. “South Australia’s big Tesla battery sued for not helping during Queensland coal power station failure.” ABC (September 22)

Perry, Mark. 2019. “The Environmental Costs of Renewable Energy Are Staggering.” FEE.org (September 15)

Driessen, Paul. 2017. “Revisiting Wind Turbine Impacts.” FCPP Commentary.

Ridley, Matt. 2017. “Wind is an Irrelevance to the Energy and Climate Debate.” Rational Optimist (May 15).

Lomborg, Bjorn. 2015. “Blowing it on the Wind.” Project Syndicate (October 21).

Driessen, Paul. 2013. “Cut Fingers, Cancer, Bats and Birds.” Townhall.com (April 6).

Hawkins, Kent. 2012. “‘Recouping cost of wind turbine may take more than a lifetime’ (Consumer Reports confirms micro-wind diseconomies).” MasterResource (August 14).

Bryce, Robert. 2011. “The Party’s Over for Big Wind.” The Huffington Post (August 12).

Booker, Christopher. 2010. “The Thanet wind farm will milk us of billions.” The Telegraph, September 25.

Boone, Jon. 2010. “Power Hungry: The Myths of “Green” Energy and the Real Fuels of the Future—by Robert Bryce (nutrition for energy appetites).” MasterResource, April 27.

Bryce, Robert. 2010. “Wind Power Won’t Cool Down the Planet.” The Wall Street Journal, August 24.

Linowes, Lisa. 2010. “Offshore Wind: DOE’s Reality Challenge.” MasterResource, October 14.

Macrae, Fiona. 2010. ” More than half of Britain’s wind farms have been built where there is not enough wind.” Mail Online, August 17.

Sickinger, Ted. 2010. “Too much of a good thing: Growth in wind power makes life difficult for grid managers.” The Oregonian, July 17.

> Canada (including Ontario)
Adams, Tom. 2006. “Review of Wind Power Results in Ontario: May to October 2006.” Energy Probe, November 15.

Cosh, Colby. 2006. “Windmills Aren’t the Answer.” National Post, November 21.

> Denmark
–, “The Practicalities of Developing Renewable Energy In The UK – In The Light of Danich Experience.” Incoteco (Denmark) ApS.

Hawkins, Kent. “Peeling Away the Onion of Denmark Wind” Parts I-IV, Master Resource, Oct. 26-29, 2010. Part I | Part II | Part III | Part IV

Mason, Dr V.C. 2005. “Wind power in West Denmark. Lessons for the UK.” Country Guardian (November).

“Wind Energy – The Case of Denmark” Executive summary, Center for Politiske Studier, September 2009.

Wasson, Matt. 2010. “Extreme Misinformation in the Washington Post: Actually, Wind Power has Reduced Denmark’s CO2 Emissions a Lot.” The Huffington Post, April 26.

– Canadian public policy on biofuels
– “An Update on Renewable Diesel Infrastructure in Canada.” Office of Energy Efficiency, Natural Resources Canada.
– “Evaluation of the Alternative Transportation Fuels Sub-Sub-Activity.” Natural Resources Canada,

Solar
– Substantial pieces
Atasu, Atalay, Serasu Duran, and Luk N. Van Wassenhove. 2021. “The Dark Side of Solar Power.” Harvard Business Review (June 18).

Calzada, G, R. Merino, J. Rallo and J. Garca. 2010. Study of the effects on employment of public aid to renewable energy sources. Instituto Juan de Mariana (University Rey Juan Carlos).

– Shorter pieces

NE Energy Systems. Undated. 5 Disadvantages of Solar Energy to the Environment

Yale University. Undated. Solar Energy Innovation, 1970s (gallery) 

Catenacci, Thomas. 2022. “From Solar Grid to Cattle Shed: How Greenpeace’s Dream of A Solar-Powered Village Fell Apart In Just A Few Years.” Daily Caller (May 15)

Shaw Stroup, Jane. 2022. “Dept. of Energy: The Cost-Effective Way to Dispose of Solar Panel Waste Is Landfill.” Liberty and Ecology (April 18).

Tavares, Stephanie. 2010. “New wave of solar plants could worsen air quality.” Las Vegas Sun, April 26.

Henderson, David. 2017. “Solar Power: Lots of Jobs per KWH is Bad, not Good.” Econlog (May 22).

Why Electricity Matters. 2017. “4 reasons why the World Bank is wrong about off-grid solar.” (October 25).

Perry, Mark J. 2017. “Today’s most productive energy workers are in coal and gas, not solar.” Washington Examiner (May 3).

Dowd, Philip. 2016. “A Solar Power Plant vs. A Natural Gas Power Plant: Capital Cost – Apples to Apples.” WUWT (April 1).

Bin, Liu. 2018. “China solar industry struggles through sudden subsidy cuts. After years of breakneck growth, solar panel manufacturers are tightening their belts as the government slashes support.” Climate Home News (August 15).

Chen, Stephen. 2017. “China’s ageing solar panels are going to be a big environmental problem. The issue of how to dispose of hazardous waste from ageing panels casts a shadow over the drive towards renewable energy and away from fossil fuels.” South China Morning Post (July 30).

Martin, Chris and Nic Querolo. 2020. “A $1 Billion Solar Plant Was Obsolete Before It Ever Went Online.” Bloomberg Businessweek (January 6).

– Geothermal

Epstein, Alex. 2022. “The Truth About Geothermal Energy.” Energy Talking Points (February 13).

SUGGESTED LINKS

• General
Fundamentals of Electricity

Natural Resources Canada on Energy

• History
Institute for Energy Research on story of electricity.

• Electricity
International Energy Agency – Electricity

• Hydro
International Energy Agency – Hydro

“Survey of Energy Resources Interim Update 2009 – Hydropower.” World Energy Council.

The World Commission on Dams

A special issue of Energy Policy (volume 30, issue 14, 2002) on “Hydropower – The Politics of Water and Energy.” November 2002.

Great Resources About Dams and Hydropower

Large Dams Under Construction by Basin Watersheds of the World: Global Maps

• Nuclear

– Renewable Electricity – Overview
“Beyond Fossil Fuels” (New York Times article series, Fall 2010)

Renewable Energy Annual by the Energy Information Agency.

Renewable Energy

Renewables – International Energy Agency

Renewable & Alternative Fuels – Energy Information Administration

About Renewable Energy – Natural Resources Canada

“Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy.” US Department of Energy.

Michael Moore. 2020. “Michael Moore Presents: Planet of the Humans (Directed by Jeff Gibbs).” (April 21).

Digital Museum of Plugs and Sockets

Net Zero Watch

Renewable Energy Foundation (opposed to renewables)

– Biomass
Global Development and Environment Institute (Tufts University). Food vs. Fuel – U.S. Biofuels and the Global Food Crisis

– Wind
Country Guardian’s Website

Alliance for Wise Energy Decisions

Glebe Mountain Group – Vermont Ecologists opposed to windwills (including the song “Tilting at Windmills”)
See especially their links to wind energy Websites

REQUIRED VIDEOS

– Overview
American Museum of Natural History. 2016. Human Population through Time.

– Pessimists
New York Times (Retro Report). 2015. The Population Bomb.

National Film Board. 2010. Test Tube (with David Suzuki) (Video).

Edmund Hillary Fellowship. 2018. “The Planetary Boundaries Framework – Johan Rockström.”

– Optimists
Learn Liberty. 2011. Are We Running Out of Resources?

Learn Liberty. 2013. Free Market Economics: A Quick History of War, OPEC, and Gas Prices – Learn Liberty.

FreeThink. 2017. “We’re All Gonna Starve!“

Dead Wrong with Johan Norberg. 2020. “Will We Run Out of Resources?” (January 22).

Human Progress. 2020. “Simon Abundance Index 2020.”

REQUIRED READINGS

Population Growth, Resources and the Environment
Deffeyes, Kenneth, & Peter Huber. 2005. “It’s the End of Oil / Oil Is Here to Stay.” Time, October 23.

Pearce, Fred. 2010. “The overpopulation myth.” Prospect Magazine, March 8.

Ridley, Matt. 2014. “Why Most Resources don’t Run Out.” Rational Optimist (April 30).

Mann, Charles. 2013. “What if We Never Run Out of Oil?” The Atlantic (May).

Smil, Vaclav. 2020. “Peak Oil: A Retrospective.” IEEE Spectrum (May): 20-21.

Jevons Paradox
Encyclopedia of Earth
– Jevons Paradox

Hertwich, Edgar. 2012. “Jevons Paradox or Not? The Myth of Resource Efficiency: The Jevons Paradox by John M. Polimeni, Kozo Mayumi, Mario Giampietro and Blake Alcott Energy Efficiency and Sustainable Consumption edited by Horace Herring and Steve Sorrell.” Journal of Industrial Ecology 16 (3) (June): 453-454.

Pessimists
– Running Out of Resources / Destroying the Environment
Quintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus (Tertullian). Approximately 203 AD. “On the Soul.” Chapter 30.

Randall, Tom and Hayley Warren. 2020. “Peak Oil is Suddenly Upon Us.” Bloomberg Green (December 1).

Rose, Morgan. 2002. “In Defense of Malthus.” Library of Economics and Liberty (September 16).

McLemee, Scott. 2015. “Past Its Peak.” Inside Higher Ed (November 4).

The Oil Drum
– Three Nails in the Coffin of Peak Oil
– Bardi, Ugo. 2008. “Crude Oil: how high can it go? (19th century whaling as a model for oil depletion and price volatility).” The Oil Drum: Europe, May 15.

Campbell, Colin C. and Jean Laherrère. 1998. “The End of Cheap Oil.” Scientific American (March): 78-83.

McDonald, Charlotte. 2015. “How Many Earths do we Need?” BBC News (June 16).

– Too Many Resources / Destroying the Environment
Monbiot, George. 2012. “We were wrong on peak oil. There’s enough to fry us all.” The Guardian (July 2).

Safina, Carl. 2014. “This Planet Comes with Limits.” CNN (May 8).

Ludden, Jennifer. 2016. “Should We Be Having Kids In The Age Of Climate Change?” NPR (August 18).

Huber, Matt. 2015. “Too Much Oil.” Jacobin (March 22).

Optimists
– Historical perspective and conceptual issues
George, Henry. 1912/1879. Progress and Poverty: An Inquiry into the Cause of Industrial Depressions and of Increase of Want with Increase of Wealth, The Remedy. Book II: Population and Subsistence. Chapter III: Inferences from Analogy (direct link).

Baumol, William J., and Blackman, Sue Anne Batey. “Natural Resources,” The Concise Encyclopedia of Economics.

Ausubel, Jesse. 1999/2000. “Resources are Elastic,” Earth Matters (Winter): 46-47.

Bradley, Rob. 2012. “Resourceship: Expanding ‘Depletable’ Resources.” Library of Economics and Liberty (May 7).

Boudreaux, Donald J. 2018. “There are No Natural Resources.” American Institute for Economic Research (November 13).

Ausubel, Jesse. 2015. “We Must Make Nature Worthless.” Real Clear Science (September 18).

Bradley, Robert. 2020. “Human Ingenuity: The Ultimate Resource (for minerals, adaptation).” Master Resource (January 7).

Note: You do NOT need to cover “Latest Trends” and “Latest News” for your SWA

– Latest trends
Institute for Energy Research. 2018. Technology Revolutionizing the Oil Industry (July 27).

Pooley, Gale and Marian L. Tupy. 2022. “The Earth was 448.5 percent more abundant in 2021 than it was in 1980.” Human Progress (April 22).

Corcoran, Terence. 2021. “Four signals from soaring fossil fuels. Current surge in oil, gas and coal markets will transform the global climate debate.” Financial Post (September 30).

– Latest News
Australian Associated Press. 2018. “200-400 Years Worth of Shale Gas: Australian Minister Announces Huge Discovery.” (September 5).

Brehmer, Elwood. 2021. “Exploration analysis suggests another billion-barrel oil prospect on Alaska’s North Slope.” Alaska Journal of Commerce (August 26, 2021).

Cohen, Ariel. 2018. “America’s Oil And Gas Reserves Double With Massive New Permian Discovery.” Forbes (December 21).

EIA. 2022. “U.S. energy facts explained” (April 10).

Perry, Mark J. 2017. “From Peak Oil to Energy Abundance. Energy expert now says the Permian Basin is a permanent, near-infinite resource.” Carpe Diem (AEIdeas) (August 21).

Bloomberg News. 2021. “China — willing to pay any price for coal — threatens world’s fuel supply. The dirtiest fossil fuel, which was struggling against cleaner energy sources, is now seeing its biggest comeback ever.” Financial Post (September 28).

SUGGESTED videoS

Royal Society (UK). 2012. People and the Planet Report. (Watch the John Sulton video).

Sabin, Paul. 2013. The Bet. Paul Ehrlich, Julian Simon, and Our Gamble over Earth’s Future. Yale University Press.

“Oil: The Next Revolution.” Harvard – Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs (June 2012) Executive Summary (excerpts video).

Words and Numbers. 2017. “The Population Boom Could Save the World.”

SUGGESTED READINGS

Historical Case Studies

• Pulp and paper

Kuhlberg, Mark. 2022. “Pulp and Paper in Canada: Its First Century.” Pulp and Paper Canada.

Kuhlbert, Mark. 2012. “Pulp and Paper Industry.” Canadian Encyclopedia.

• UK coal

Wikipedia – Coal Mining in the United Kingdom

Ritchie, Hannah. 2019. “The death of UK coal in five charts.” Our World in Data (January 28).

Pessimists
Overview

Wellmer, Friedrich-W. Forthcoming. “What we have learned from the past and how we should look forward.” Mineral Economics.

Järvensivu, Paavo et al. 2018. Global Sustainable Development Report 2019. Group of Independent Scientists – Invited background document on economic transformation (August 14).

World Economic Forum. 2014. Resource scarcity – The Future Availability of Natural Resources – A New Paradigm for Global Resource Availability.

Manfredo, Michael J., Jerry J. Vaske, Andreas Rechkemmer and Esther A. Duke. 2014. Understanding Society and Natural Resources. Forging New Strands of Integration Across the Social Sciences, Springer.

Hall, Charles A.S. 2004. “The Myth of Sustainable Development: Personal Reflections on Energy, its Relation to Neoclassical Economics, and Stanley Jevons.” Journal of Energy Resources Technology 126: 85-89.

Pre-World War II

Seow, Victor. 2022. The Coal Question in the Age of Carbon. Joint Center for History and Economics (Harvard University and Cambridge University).

Mathis, Charles-François. 2018. “King Coal Rules: Accepting or Refusing Coal Dependency in Victorian Britain.” French Journal of British Studies 23 (3).

Gore, George. 1885. “A Scientific View of the Coal Question.” Popular Science Monthly 27 (May). 

Report of the Commissioners appointed to inquire into the several matters relating to coal in the United Kingdom. 1871. Printed by G.E. Eyre and W. Spottiswoode for HMSO.

Post World War II

Nørgård, Jørgen Stig, John Peet, Kristín Vala Ragnarsdóttir. 2010. “The History of The Limits to Growth.” Solutions 1 (2): 59-63.

Osborn, Fairfield. 1948. Our Plundered Planet, Osborn, Fairfield, Little, Brown, Boston.

Peak Oil (and Natural Gas)

“Hubbert Peak” on Wikipedia.

Bruce Railsback, L. Bruce. 2012. “Depth and Nature of Giant Petroleum Discoveries Through Time as an Indicator of Resource Depletion.” Journal of Industrial Ecology 17 (3) 345-351.

Mieszkowski, Katharine. 2006. “The Oil is Going, The Oil is Going!” Salon.com, March 22.

Crawford, Dan. 2006. “Natural gas has eight years left.” The Republic, no 131, February 2 to 14.

Hirsch, Robert L., Roger H. Bezdek & Robert M. Wendling. 2005. “Peaking Oil Production: Sooner Rather Than Later?” Issues in Science and Technology, 21 (3).

Kirby, Alex. 2004. “When the Last Oil Well Runs Dry.” BBC News World Edition, April 19.

Deffeyes, Kenneth S. 2003. Hubbert’s Peak: The Impending World Oil Shortage. Princeton University Press. Chapter 1

Laherrère, Jean. 2000. “Learn Strengths, Weaknesses to Understand Hubbert Curve,” Oil & Gas Journal 98 (16): 63-76.

Campbell, Colin. 1997. The Coming Oil Crisis. Multi-Science Publishing Company & Petroconsultants. Chapter 15 “Synthesis – What it all amounts to?”

Overpopulation (recent)

Whitty, Julia. “The Last Taboo.” Mother Jones, May-June 2010 Issue.

Collins, Donald A. 2007. “The Great Population Debate: An Opinion Paper.” The Journal of Social, Political and Economic Studies, Volume 32, Number 1, Spring 2007.

Optimists
Overview

Mueller, Philipp. 2013. “The Abundance of Fossil Fuels.” Global Warming Policy Foundation (Briefing Paper 6).

Stroup, Richard. 2008. “Review of The Bottomless Well: The Twilight of Fuel, the Virtue of Waste, and Why We Will Never Run Out of Energy by Peter W. Huber and Mark P. Mills.” The Independent Review, Vol. 12, No 3 (Winter).

Brätland, John. 2008. “Resource Exhaustibility: A Myth Refuted by Entrepreneurial Capital Maintenance.” The Independent Review, Volume 12, Number 3, Winter.

Rozeff, Michael S. 2008. “The Coming Oil Price Decline.” LewRockwell.com, January 16.

Adelman, M. A. 2004. “The Real Oil Problem.” Regulation (Spring): 16-21.

Bradley Jr, Robert. 2004. “Are We Running Out of Oil?” PERC Reports, September.

Porter, Edward D. 1995. “Are We Running Out of Oil?,” Discussion Paper #81, American Petroleum Institute, December 1995.

Pre World War II

Emmett, Ross B. 2006. “Malthus Reconsidered: Population, Natural Resources and Markets.” PERC Policy Series #38.

Engels, Frederick. “Outlines of a Critique of Political Economy (excerpt).” October and November 1843.

Post World War II

Worstall, Tim. 2015. The No Breakfast Fallacy. Why the Club of Rome was wrong about us running out of resources. Adam Smith Institute.

–, 1948. “Eat Hearty.” Time, November 8.

Peak Oil

Lynch, Michael and Ivan Sandrea. 2021. The Pandemic and the End of Oil? The Pandemic, Peak Oil Demand, and the Oil Industry – By Michael Lynch and Ivan Sandrea – EPRINC.

Menton, Francis. 2021. “Manhattan Contrarian Announces The Arrival Of “Peak Oil-Hysteria.”” Manhattan Contrarian (November 3).

Rodrigue, Jean-Paul. 2020. “World Annual Oil Production and Peak Oil.” The Geography of Transport Systems.

Bradley Jr, Robert. 2018. “Oil Depletion Protocol (Colin Campbell’s Falsified Pretense of Knowledge).” Master Resource (July 18).

Bradley Jr., Robert. 2016. “Peak Oil Consensus 2008: Lesson for ‘Settled’ Climate Science.” Master Resource (September 29).

Bailey, Ronald. 2016. “Where Have All the Peak Oilers Gone? Dancing on the grave of “peak oil” – will it stay buried?” Reason (January 21).

Hayward, Steven. 2016. “An End to Peak Nonsense?” Powerline Blog (January 13).

Smil, Vaclav. 2014. “Are Low Oil Prices Good or Bad?” The American (December 22).

Smil, Vaclav. 2013. “Memories of Peak Oil.” The American Magazine (February 2).

Glover, Peter C. 2012. “Whatever happened to peak oil?” The Commentator (August 15).

Bailey, Ronald. 2009. “Peak Oil, Revisited.” Reason Magazine, October.

Bailey, Ronald. 2009. “Peak Oil: The Threat of Resource Nationalism.” Reason Magazine, August 20.

Hossein-Zadeh, Ismael. 2008. “A Powerful Trap. The Recurring Myth of Peak Oil.” Counterpunch, October 1.

Press, Daryl G., and Eugene Gholz. 2007. “Energy Alarmism: The Myths That Make Americans Worry about Oil.” Cato Institute, Policy Analysis no. 589, April 5.

Smil, Vaclav. 2007. “Peak performance.” Tech Central Station, February 23

Smil, Vaclav. 2006. “Peak Oil: A Catastrophist Cult and Complex Realities.” World Watch 19: 22-24.

Lynch, Michael. 2006. “Crop Circles in the Desert: The Strange Controversy Over Saudi Oil Production.” International Research Center for Energy and Economic Development, Occasional Papers: Number Forty.

Hamilton, James. 2006. “Is Peak Oil Irrelevant?” Econbrowser.com, October 24.

Bailey, Ronald. 2006. “Peak Oil Panic – Is The Planet Running Out of Gas? If It Is, What Should the Bush Administration Do About It?” Reason Online, May.

Hamilton, James. 2006. “ExxonMobil and Peak Oil.” Econbrowser.com, March 14.

Friedman, David. 2006. “Peak Oil?” Ideas, March 10.

–, 2005. “Does ‘Peak Oil’ Spell Death for the Suburbs?” Vanishing Automobile Update #56, September 30.

Smil, Vaclav. 2005. “Peak Curiosity.” Tech Central Station, December 2.

Featherstone, Charles H. 2005. “A Challenge to Peak Oilers.” LewRockwell.com, August 15.

Lynch, Michael. 2004. The New Pessimism about Petroleum Resources: Debunking the Hubbert Model (and Hubbert Modelers) Energyseer.com.

Bailey, Ronald. 2004. “Are We Out of Gas Yet? The Continuing ‘Oil Crisis’ Crisis.” ReasonOnline, March 18.

Kleit, Andrew N. 2002. “An Economic Theory of Shortage. Review of Kenneth S. Deffeyes’ Hubbert’s Peak: The Impending World Oil Shortage,” Regulation (Fall): 69-70. (Scroll down to p. 5)

Population Growth and Resources (recent)

Bailey, Ronald. 2017. “Physical Scientists Are So Darned Cute When They Finally Understand Economics. Geologists analyze the myth of mineral resource exhaustion.” Reason (May 1).

Will, George. 2012. “Why doom has not materialized.” The Washington Post (August 17).

O’Neill, Brendan. 2011. “The definitive guide to modern-day Malthusians.” Spiked Online, January 13

O’Neill, Brendan. 2009. “Too many people? No, too many Malthusians.” Spiked Online, November 19.

General
Nillesen, Eleonora and Erwin Bulte. 2014. “Natural Resources and Violent Conflict.” Annual Review of Resource Economics 6: 69-83.

Adelman, Morris A. 1997. “My Education in Mineral (Especially Oil) Economics,” Annual Review of Energy and the Environment 22: 13-46.

Auerback, Marshall. 2005. “Oil: Geologists vs. Economists.” PrudentBear.com, September 13.

Bradley, Robert L and Richard W. Fulmer. Energy: The Master Resource, Kendall Hunt Publishing Company, 2004, Chapter 4: Will We Run Out of Energy?

Bradley, Robert L. and Richard W. Fulmer. Energy: The Master Resource, Kendall Hunt Publishing Company, 2004, Chapter 7: Energy for the Future.

Ellis, Erle C. 2012. “Overpopulation is not the problem.” The New York Times (September 13).

Groshong, Kimm. 2004. “Debate centers on oil reserves.” Pasadena Star-News, December 14.

Hamilton, James & Kash Mansori. 2006. “The Perils of Forecasting.” The Wall Street Journal, January 26.

Hammes, David and Douglas Wills, “Black Gold: The End of Bretton Woods and the Oil-Price Shocks of the 1970s.” The Independent Review 9 (Spring 2005): 501-11.

Höök, Mikael, Simon Davidsson, Sheshti Johansson and Xu Tang. 2014. “Decline and Depletion Rates of Oil Production: A comprehensive investigation.” Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences 372 (2006).

“Kenneth Deffeyes and Peter R. Odell on Counterpoint.” Global Public Media.

Kratkraemer, Jeffrey A. 2005. “Economics of Natural Resource Scarcity: The State of the Debate.” Resources for the Future, Discussion Paper 05-14.

Linden, Henry R. 1996. “The Evolution of an Energy Contrarian,” Annual Review of Energy and the Environment 21: 31-67.

Peart, Sandra J., and David M. Levy, 2005. “Happiness, Progress and the ‘Vanity of the Philosopher’.” The Library of Economics and Liberty, June 6.

Rogner, H-H. 1997. “An Assessment of World Hydrocarbon Resources,” Annual Review of Energy and the Environment 22: 217-262.

Seale, Avrel. 2005. “How Long Do We Have?” The Alcalde, July/August, p. 40-45.

Simpson, R. David, Michael A. Toman and Robert U. Ayres. 2004. “Scarcity and Growth in the New Millennium: Summary.” Discussion Paper 04-01, Washington: Resources for the Future.

Smil, Vaclav. 2005. “Limits to Growth revisited: A review essay.” Population and Development Review. 31: 157-164.

Smil, Vaclav. 1998. “Future of Oil: Trends and Surprises.” OPEC Review 22 (4): 253-276.

Hotelling’s Rule
“Hotelling’s Rule.” From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Cowen, Tyler. 2004. “Oil Prices and Time.” Marginal Revolution, May 19.

Haab, Tim. 2005. “Oil prices: Hotelling’s Rule, Futures and Options.” Environmental Economics, July 7.

Roberts, Russell. 2004. “Why Oil (and Lots of Other Stuff) Gets Cheaper.” Café Hayek, May 20.

Simon, Julian. 1990. “Hotelling’s Law: Is it Useful or Wasteful?” September 6.

The Simon-Ehrlich Bet
–, “Julian Lincoln Simon,” Wikipedia.

–, “Overpopulation,” Wikipedia.

–, “Thomas Malthus,” Wikipedia.

–, “Paul R. Ehrlich,” Wikipedia.

McClintick, David, and Ross B. Emmett. 2005. “Betting on The Wealth Of Nature.” Perc Reports, September.

Regis, Ed. 1997. “The Doomslayer,” Wired 5 (2) (February).

Perry, Mark J. 2008. “Would Julian Simon Have Won a Second Bet?” Carpe Diem, February 13.

Perry, Mark. 2013. “Julian Simon: Still more right than lucky in 2013.” Carpe Diem (AEIdeas) (January 12).

Wagner, John E. and David H. Newman. 2013. “The Simon-Ehrlich Bet: Teaching Relative vs Absolute Scarcity.” The American Economist 58 (1): 16-26.

Desrochers, Pierre. 2015. “The Simon-Ehrlich Wager 25 Years On.” Spiked (September 29).

Desrochers, Pierre and Vincent Geloso. 2016. “Snatching the Wrong Conclusions from the Jaws of Defeat: A Historical/Resourceship Perspective on Paul Sabin’s The Bet: Paul Ehrlich, Julian Simon, and Our Gamble over Earth’s Future (Yale University Press, 2013), Part 2: The Wager: Protagonists and Lessons.” New Perspectives on Political Economy 12 (1-2): 42-64.

Desrochers, Pierre and Vincent Geloso. 2016. “Snatching the Wrong Conclusions from the Jaws of Defeat: A Historical/Resourceship Perspective on Paul Sabin’s The Bet: Paul Ehrlich, Julian Simon, and Our Gamble over Earth’s Future (Yale University Press, 2013). Part 1: The Missing History of Thought: Depletionism vs Resourceship.” New Perspectives on Political Economy 12 (1-2): 5-41.

Mann, Charles. 2018. “The Book That Incited a Worldwide Fear of Overpopulation – ‘The Population Bomb’ made dire predictions-and triggered a wave of repression around the world.” Smithsonian Magazine (January).

Tupy, Marian L. 2018. Julian Simon Was Right: A Half-Century of Population Growth, Increasing Prosperity, and Falling Commodity Prices on Julian Simon. Economic Development Bulletin No. 29.

McClintick, David, and Ross B. Emmett. 2005. “Betting on the Wealth of Nature. The Simon-Ehrlich Wager.” PERC Report 23 (3) (Fall).

Kedrosky, Paul. 2010. “Taking Another Look at Simon vs. Ehrlich on Commodity Prices.” Seeking Alpha (February 19).

Tupy, Marian L. 2018. “The Counter-intuitive Truth about the World’s Resources.” CapX (December 7) (Original study available here).

Bailey, Ronald. 2018. “Resources Are Almost 5 Times as Abundant as They Were in 1980. New Simon Abundance Index elegantly refutes primitive zero-sum intuitions with respect to population and resource availability trends.” Reason (December 4).

The Lomborg Affair
A video debate between Bjorn Lomborg and Daniel Kammen of the Energy and Resources Group (UC Berkeley), originally aired on PBS’s Uncommon Knowledge in 2002.

Bradley, Robert. 2003. The Heated Energy Debate: Assessing John Holdren’s Attack on Bjorn Lomborg’s The Skeptical Environmentalist. Competitive Enterprise Institute.

Frost, Caroline. 2002. “The Sceptical Environmentalist.” BBC Four, September 2.

–, “Bjørn Lomborg,” Wikipedia.

Kysar, Douglas. 2003. “Some Realism about Environmental Skepticism.” Ecological Law Quarterly 30: 223-279.

Lomborg, Bjørn. 2004. “The Skeptical Environmentalist.” In Anderson, Terry (ed.) You Have to Admit It’s Getting Better. Hoover Institution Press, p. 2-51.

Pope, Carl & Bjørn Lomborg. 2005. “The State of Nature: Our Roof Is Caving in / Let’s Try Priorities, not Propaganda.” Foreign Policy, July/August.

Special issue of Environmental Science and Policy (Vol. 7, Issue 5, October 2004) on “The Politicization of Science: Learning from the Lomborg Affair.”

The Jevons Paradox, a.k.a the “Rebound Effect”
Biography of William Stanley Jevons (1835-82), The Concise Encyclopedia of Economics.

William Stanley Jevons, 1835-1882

Jevons Paradox, from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Alcott, Blake, 2005. “Jevons Paradox.” Ecological Economics 54 (1): 9-21.

Hertwich, Edgar G. 2005. “Consumption and the Rebound Effect: An Industrial Ecology Perspective.” Journal of Industrial Ecology, Vol. 9, 1-2 (Special Issue on Consumption and Industrial Ecology – Winter-Spring) pp. 85-98.

Gottron, Frank. 2001. “RS20981: Energy Efficiency and the Rebound Effect: Does Increasing Efficiency Decrease Demand?” CRS Report for Congress, July 30.

A special issue of the journal Energy Policy, Volume 28, Numbers 6-7, 2000: “On the Rebound: The Interaction of Energy Efficiency, Energy Use and Economic Activity.”

Sorrell, Steve. 2009. “Jevons’ Paradox Revisited. The Evidence for Backfire from Improved Energy Efficiency.” Energy Policy 37(4): 1456-1469.

William Stanley Jevons, The Coal Question; An Inquiry Concerning the Progress of the Nation, and the Probable Exhaustion of Our Coalmines (1865)

Nordaus, Ted. 2017. “The Energy Rebound Battle.” Issues in Science and Technology 33 (4) (Summer) VOL. XXXIII, NO. 4, SUMMER 2017.

Ecological Footprint
“Ecological Footprint.” Wikipedia.

Global Footprint Network

Earth Overshoot Day

Living Planet Report – past issues

Sustainability 2 (6), Special issue “Ecological Footprint Indicator.”

Blomqvist, Linus. Date unknown. “It’s Time to Scrap the Ecological Footprint – Earth Overshoot Day Is Fundamentally Meaningless.” Breakthrough Institute.

Wackernagel, M. et al. “Ecological Footprints of Nations.” The Earth Council (date unknown).

Rees, William. “Revisiting Carrying Capacity: Area-Based Indicators of Sustainability.” (Revised version, date unknown)

Gordon, Peter and Harry Richardson. 1998. “Farmland Preservation and Ecological Footprints: A Critique,” Planning and Markets 1 (1).

Rees, William E. 2002. “Footprint: Our Impact on Earth is Getting Heavier.” Nature 420 (November 21), 267-268.

Wackernagel, Mathis, Niels B. Schulz, Diana Deumling, Alejandro Callejas Linares, Martin Jenkins, Valerie Kapos, Chad Monfreda, Jonathan Loh, Norman Myers, Richard Norgaard, & Jørgen Randers. 2002. “Tracking the Ecological Overshoot of the Human Economy.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), June 27.

Bailey, Ronald. 2002. “The End Is Nigh, Again,” ReasonOnline, June 26.

Jørgensen, A. et al. 2002. “Assessing the Ecological Footprint: A Look at the WWF’s Living Planet 2002 Report.” Environmental Assessment Institute.

Kinver, Mark. 2006. “Britain Now ‘Eating the Planet’.” BBC News, April 15.

Fiala, Nathan. 2008. “Commentary: Measuring sustainability: Why the ecological footprint is bad economics and bad environmental science.” Ecological Economics 67 (4): 519-525.

Willis Eschenbach, Willis. 2010. “Ecological Footprints – A Good Idea Gone Bad.” WUWT (August 26).

Blomqvist, Linus, Barry W. Brook, Erle C. Ellis, Peter M. Kareiva, Ted Nordhaus and Michael Shellenberger. 2013. “Does the Shoe Fit? Real versus Imagined Ecological Footprints.” PLOS Biology 11(11): e1001700.

Recent News
MacKinson, Lindsay. 2018. “Celebrating a Record-Shattering 2018 for U.S. Oil & Natural Gas.” Energy in Depth (December 20).

SUGGESTED LINKS

General
US Department of the Interior (US Geological Survey)

A talk by economist James Hamilton on the “Peak Oil” controversy

The Abiotic Oil Debate and “Peak Oil”

The Interview: Thomas Homer-Dixon

World Economic Forum. 2014. The Future Availability of Natural Resources. A New Paradigm for Global Resource Availability (World Scenario Series).

Pessimists
Association for the Study of Peak Oil & Gas

Club of Rome

Energy Bulletin

Oildepletion.Org

The Oil Depletion Analysis Centre (ODAC)

The Oil Drum – Discussions About Energy and Our Future

“The End of Fossil Fuels” on Die Off

The Global Oil Crisis Website

UK Energy Research Centre

Simplicity Institute

Theme Issue ‘The future of oil supply’ organised and edited by Richard G. Miller and Steve R. Sorrell. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences. Volume 372, Issue 2006 (13 January 2014).

Optimists
Remembering Julian Simon. Freedom Network and the Heartland Institute.

Bjørn Lomborg’s (The Skeptical Environmentalist) Website

Peak Oil Debunked

REQUIRED VIDEOS

We will watch two videos
– Productive Conversations: Dutch Disease Explained (Financial Post)
– The Devil’s Footpath, written and presented by June Arunga.

REQUIRED Audio

Davies, Viv. 2012. “The Oil Curse: How Petroleum Wealth Shapes the Development of Nations.” Vox (April 20) (audio and transcript).

REQUIRED READINGS

• General Statement
Palley, Thomas I. 2003. “Lifting the Natural Resource Curse.” Foreign Service Journal, December.

• Resource Curse (Debate)
Ali, Saleem H. 2010. Beyond The Resource Curse: Minerals and Global Development. Pardee Center, Issues in Brief, No. 12.

Palda, Filip. 2003. “The High Price of Natural Wealth.” Fraser Forum, January, 30-31.

Ryan, Kieron E. 2010. “Blood Diamonds Farce.” LewRockwell.com, August 11.

van den Bremer, Ton Rick van der Ploeg. 2012. “Managing and Harnessing Volatile Oil Windfalls: Three Funds, Three Countries and Three Stories.” Vox (December 14). 

Wall, Alan. 2013. “PEMEX’s Throttling Mexico’s Oil Resources.” American Thinker (September 4).

Vostroknutova, Ekaterina, Milan Brahmbhatt and Otaviano Canuto. 2010. “Dealing with Dutch Disease.” VOX (June 21). 

• Odious Debt
Adams, Patricia. 2002. “The Doctrine of Odious Debts: Using the Law to Cancel Illegitimate Debts.” Probe International, June 21.

• Energy Security
Cahill, Ben. 2022. “To Boost Energy Security, Keep It Simple: Add Supply, Cut Demand.” CSIS (July 7).

Harris, Mark. 2022. “Does energy security lie in being more connected or less connected?” Anthropocene (March 17).

Morgan, Gwyn. 2022. “How to Create Impoverishment and Energy Insecurity.” C2C (March 14).

Stewart, John. 2020. Canada’s Energy Security: Would Deglobalization Change the Game? Canadian Global Affairs Institute.

Medlock III, Kenneth. 2016. “Could trade help achieve energy security?” World Economic Forum (March 3).

SUGGESTED READINGS

Resource Curse and Dutch Disease
• Overview and policy options
– Historical perspective
Boianovsky, Mauro. 2013. “Humboldt and the economists on natural resources, institutions and underdevelopment (1752 to 1859).” The European Journal of the History of Economic Thought 20 (1): 58-88.

– Substantial pieces
“Resource curse.” Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

“Rent seeking.” Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

What Dutch disease? – Econlib

Antonio Savoia and Kunal Sen. 2021. “The Political Economy of the Resource Curse: A Development Perspective.”  Annual Review of Resource Economics 13: 203-223.

Bannon, Ian and Paul Collier, eds. “Natural Resources and Violent Conflict.” The World Bank, 2003.

Birdsall, Nancy and Arvind Subramanian. 2004. “Saving Iraq from its Oil,” Foreign Affairs, July, pp. 77-89.

Boschini, A.D. et al. 2003. “Resource Curse or Not : A Question of Appropriability.” Department of Economics, Stockholm University.

Challender, Chloe, Annie Heaton, Fiona King, Vanessa Herringshaw and Bill Bell. “Lifting the Resource Curse – Extractive Industry, Children and Governance.” Briefing Report, Save the Children, 2003.

Conca, Ken. 2012. “Decoupling Water and Violent Conflict.” Issues in Science and Technology 29 (Fall).

Coronel, Gustavo. 2006. “Corruption, Mismanagement, and Abuse of Power in Hugo Chávez’s Venezuela.” Development Policy Analysis no. 2, Cato Institute, November 27.

Davis, Graham A. and John E. Tilton. “The Resource Curse.” Natural Resources Forum, Volume 29 Issue 3, p. 233 – August 2005.

Ghazvinian, John. 2007. “The Curse of Oil.” Virginia Quarterly Review, Volume 83, Number 1.

Haber, Stephen, and Victor Menaldo. 2011. “Do Natural Resources Fuel Authoritarianism? A Reappraisal of the Resource Curse.” The American Political Science Review 105 (1): 1–26.

Ramírez-Cendrero, Juan Manuel and Eszter Wirth. 2016. “Is the Norwegian model exportable to combat Dutch disease?” Resources Policy 48: 85-96.

Harford, Tim, and Michael Klein. 2005. “Aid and the Resource Curse – How Can Aid Be Designed to Preserve Institutions?” Public Policy for the Private Sector 291 (April).

Jones Luong, Pauline, and Erika Weinthal. 2006. “Rethinking The Resource Curse: Ownership Structure, Institutional Capacity, and Domestic Constraints.” Annual Review of Political Science Vol. 9: 241-263 (June).

Le Billon, Philippe, “The political ecology of war: Natural resources and armed conflict,” Political Geography 20 (2001), pp. 561-584.

Martinez, Ibsen. 2006. “Reflections from Latin America – OPEC: A Texan Idea Twice Thought In Venezuela.” Library of Economics and Liberty, August 7.

Moreen, Amber Linea. 2006. “Overcoming the ‘Resource Curse’ – Prioritizing Policy Interventions in Countries with Large Extractive Industries.” RAND Corporation, October.

Papyrakis, Elissaios and Reyer Gerlagh. 2004. “The Resource Curse Hypothesis and its Transmission Channels.” Journal of Comparative Economics 32 (1): 181-193.

Ross, Michael L. 2013. The Oil Curse: How Petroleum Wealth Shapes the Development of Nations. Princeton University Press. 

Ross, Michael. 2006. “A Closer Look at Oil, Diamonds, and Civil War.” Annual Review of Political Science Vol. 9: 265-300 (June).

Stevens, Paul J. 2006. “Resource Curse and How to Avoid It?” Journal of Energy and Development 31 (1): 1-20.

Stevens, Paul. 2003. “Resource Impact: A Curse or a Blessing?” Centre for Energy, Petroleum and Mineral Law and Policy, University of Dundee, Draft Working Paper, April 22.

Van der Ploeg, Frederick and Anthony J. Venables. 2012. “Natural Resource Wealth: The Challenge of Managing a Windfall.” Annual Review of Economics 4: 315?337.

Van der Ploeg, Frederick. 2011. “Natural Resources: Curse or Blessing?” Journal of Economic Literature 49 (2): 366-420.

Weinthal, Erika, and Jones, Pauline. 2006. “Combating the Resource Curse: An Alternative Solution to Managing Mineral Wealth.” Perspectives on Politics 4(01):35 – 53 (March).

Anouk S. Rigterink, Anouk. S. 2010. “Natural resources and civil conflict: An overview of controversies, consensus, and channels.” The Economics of Peace and Security Journal 5 (2): 17-22.

– Shorter texts
Bailey, Ronald. 2007. “Political Peak Oil – One Thing Stands in the Way of Secure and Abundant Supplies of Oil: Government. ” ReasonOnline, January 5.

Fernandez, Richard. 2016. “The Death of a Nation.” PJ Media, April 28.

Ghersi, Enrique. 2006. “Peru’s Mining Crisis.” The Independent Institute, September 15.

Mathiesen, Karl. 2017. “Into the Abyss: Oil states face turmoil as climate policies bite.” Climate Change News (April 1). 

“The Curse of Resources.” Bastard Sword (Blog), January 26, 2004.

• Canada
– Substantial pieces
Beinea, Michel, Charles S. Bosb & Serge Coulombec. “Does the Canadian economy suffer from Dutch disease?” Resource and Energy Economics, Volume 34, Issue 4, November 2012, Pages 468-492.

Campbell, Bruce. 2013. The Petro-Path Not Taken Comparing Norway with Canada and Alberta’s Management of Petroleum Wealth. Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (January).

Cross, Philip. 2013. “Dutch Disease, Canadian Cure: How Manufacturers Adapted to the Higher Dollar.” A Macdonald-Laurier Institute Publication (January).

Cross, Philip. 2013. Six Myths Surrounding the Development of Canada’s Natural Resources. MacDonald-Laurier Institute, Executive Summary and pp. 12-14.

Holden, Michael. 2013. From Dead Ducks to Dutch Disease. The vilification of Canada’s Oil Sands in the media. Canada West Foundation (January 13).

– Shorter pieces
Patrick, Roland. 2006. “Thanks Hugo… Hoser – Canada Benefits From Venezuela’s Export of Petroleum Engineers.” Let’s Fly Under the Bridge, April 3.

Bergevin, Philippe. 2006. “Energy Resources: Boon or Curse for the Canadian Economy?” Economics Division, Parliamentary Information and Research Service (PIRS) of the Library of Parliament  31 March. 

• Resource Curse, Dutch Disease and the Canadian Economy
Cross, Philip. 2013. “Dutch Disease in Canada a myth.” National Post (January 16).

Holden, Michael. 2012. “Is Canada suffering from Dutch Disease?” Canada West Foundation Blog (June 4).

Isfeld, Gordon. 2012. “Mark Carney dismisses Dutch Disease, says oil strength sign of success.” Financial Post (September 7).

Kelly-Gagnon, Michel. 2012. “Dear Mr. Thomas Mulcair…” Toronto Star (June 25).

Nikiforuk, Andrew. 2013. “Oh Canada. How America’s Friendly Northern Neighbor became a Rogue, Reckless Petrostate.” Foreign Policy (June 24). 

Leach, Andrew. 2013. “Ottawa is no Caracas.” Foreign Policy (September-October).

Energy Security: Autarky or Trade?
See the relevant readings here.

SUGGESTED LINKS

A National Public Radio series (originally aired in August 2005) on “Oil Money Divides Nigeria.”

“The Dark Side of Natural Resources” and “Oil and Natural Gas” on the Global Policy Forum.

The second installment (“The Oil Curse”) of the 3 part CBC series “Oil: The World Over a Barrel.”

Odious Debt

Exorcizing the Resource Curse: Minerals as a Knowledge Industry, Past and Present

Mehlum, Halvor, Karl Moene and Ragnar Torvik. 2006. “Institutions and the Resource Curse.” The Economic Journal, 116 (January), 1–20. Royal Economic Society (earlier non-gated version available here).

Brunnschweiler, Christa N., Erwin H. Bulte. “The Resource Curse Revisited and Revised: A Tale of Paradoxes and Red Herrings.” Working Paper 06/61, Economics Working Paper Series, December 2006.

The Curse of Oil. Jean-Pierre Beaurenaud, Les Films du Village, France 5, Zarafa Films.

Williams, A. and P. Le Billon, eds. (2017) Corruption, Natural Resources and Development: From Resource Curse to Political Ecology. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar.

REQUIRED VIDEOS

• Historical Perspective
– Before the car
MPO Production. Date unknown. “The American Road.” 

“Late 1890s – A Trip Through Paris, France” (speed corrected w/ added sound). 

British Pathé. Date unknown. “Early English Traffic: Turn of the Century London (1896-1903).” 

Edison Company. 1901. “Montreal Fire Department on Runners” (Library of Congress). 

– Early Years
History Channel. Henry Ford Videos – The Invention of the Automobile (For more on the history of the assembly line and cost reduction at the Ford Company, see Model T Assembly Line)

New York 1911 (Short version; extended version, speed corrected w/ added sound). 

Driving Around New York City – 1928. 

– Tractors
CharlieDeanArchives. Horseless Farming With Ford Tractors – 1917.

– Future cars in retrospect
Cars Of The Future from 1948. 

King Rose Archives. 2013. “Firebird I – 1st Turbine Powered Car” (February 7).

– Electric car
World Evolution. 2019. “Evolution of Electric Cars 1884-2019 History.”

Stossel. 2013. “A Green Car’s Dirty Secret?” (See also Praeger. 2016. Are Electric Cars Really Green?; CNN. 2009. History of the Electric Car).

Reason TV. 2018. “Remy: It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas (EV Tax Credit Edition).” 

AwakenWithJP. 2020. “Tesla – Pretend to Save the Environment While Looking Rich.” (February 4).

REQUIRED READINGS

• Before the Car
Tarr, Joel and Clay McShane. 1997. “The Centrality of the Horse to the Nineteenth-Century American City.” Excerpt posted on the Environmental Literacy Council’s Webpage. 

Miller, Kirsten. 2012. “The Irregular Guide to New York Entry #5: Toxic Muck.” Bank St Irregular (October 21). 

Lee, Dwight R. 2007. “Thank You, Internal-Combustion Engine, for Cleaning up the Environment. Widespread Pollution from Horse Manure Caused Diseases and Produced Methane Gas.” Fee.org (October 1). 

Avery, Dennis T. 2000. “Praising The Gas Engine On Earth Day.” Center for Global Food Issue (Hudson Institute) (April 14).

• Historical Perspective and Overall Challenges
Kinney Bennett, Ralph. 2008. “Why Gasoline Is Still King.” The American Magazine, December 17.

Henderson, David. 2018. “Are Cars Much Better than 50 Years Ago?” Library of Economics and Liberty. 

Smil, Vaclav. 2021. “The Age of the Car Is Gone, That of the SUV Has Succeeded.” IEEE Spectrum (August).

• Diesel
Smil, Vaclav. 2017. “Diesel Engine at 120.” IEEE Spectrum (February): 24.

Uniquecarsandparts.com.au. “The History of the Diesel Engine.”

Eric Peters Auto. 2015. “No More Affordable Diesel.” (October 8).

• Natural Gas
Fuel for Thought. 2012. “The First Natural Gas Vehicles.” (April 27).

Naturalgas.org. “Natural Gas in the Transportation Sector.”

• Electric Car
– History
Gold, Aaron. 2020. “Gasoline vs Electric Cars: Not Much Has Changed in 100 Years. We must not have learned from history, because we’re repeating it.” Motortrend (February 27).

Kay, William. 2019. “Europe Electroglides Passed Climate Alarmism’s Point of No Return.” Principia Scientific International (May 13).

– Technical, Economic and Environmental Challenges
# Overview
Pan, Henry. 2021. “Reliability problems stall transition to electric buses.” Minnesota Reformer (August 31).

Bryce, Robert. 2021. “It’s Time to Unplug the Hype Over Electric Vehicles.” Real Clear Energy (July 11).

Peters, Eric. 2020. “A Not Ludicrous EV.” Eric Peters Auto (March 3).

Peters, Eric. 2019. “The Double-Batteried Electric Polecat.” Eric Peters Auto (January 24). 

Peters, Eric. 2018. “GM Kills the Electric Car.” Eric Peters Auto (November 28).

Smil, Vaclav. 2017. “Electric Vehicles: Not so Fast.” IEEE Spectrum (December): 24.

Coggins, James R. 2021. “The Future with Zero-Emission Electric Vehicles.” C2C (November 24).

# Technical
Peters, Eric. 2021. “Who Killed the Electric Car . . .That Worked?” Eric Peters Auto (August 29).

Hopper, Tristin. 2021. “The big looming problem with old EVs: It’s really, really hard to change the battery. Even on a vehicle with only 150,000 km, battery replacement can be more expensive than the car’s value.” Financial Post (August 13).

Reuter, Dominick. 2021. “1 in 5 electric vehicle owners in California switched back to gas because charging their cars is a hassle, research shows.” Yahoo! Money (July 28).

Brignall, Miles. 2020. “Why did it take nine hours to go 130 miles in our new electric Porsche?” The Guardian (November 28).

Wallach, Omri. 2020. “Visualizing the Range of EVs on Major Highway Routes.” Visual Capitalist (September 24).

Wirtz, Bill. 2019. “Electric Cars vs. Gas Cars: Is the Conventional Wisdom Wrong? What rings true intuitively isn’t always backed up by the numbers.” Fee.org (September 27).

Peters, Eric. 2019. “Recharge Anxiety.” Eric Peters Auto (August 2).

Dears, Donn. 2017. “Post-Internal Combustion Engine? Doing the UK Math.” Master Resource (August 22). 

# Economic (costs and supply)
Edelstein, Stephen. 2021. “California heat waves prompt alerts about EV charging habits, energy conservation.” Green Car Reports (June 23).

Booth, David. 2017. “Motor Mouth: More inconvenient truths on banning gas engines – High-speed EV recharging stations on highways sound great – until you hear how much they would cost.” Driving (October 6). 

Anderson Economic Group. 2021. “6 months of independent research finds fueling costs for electric vehicles (EV) are often higher than for internal combustion engines (ICE).” (October 21).

Anderson Economic Group. 2021. Comparison: Real World Cost of Fueling EVs and ICE Vehicles. (October 21).

# Environmental
Gottesfeld, Perry. 2021. “Opinion: Electric Cars’ Looming Recycling Problem: Financial incentives to recycle spent electric vehicle batteries are eroding. That could spell environmental disaster.” Undark (January 21).

Lieberman, Ben. 2020. “New CEI Paper Asks: Would More Electric Vehicles be Good for the Environment?” CEI Press Release (November 17).

Rolander, Niclas, Jesper Starn and Elisabeth Behrmann. 2018. “Lithium Batteries’ Dirty Secret: Manufacturing Them Leaves Massive Carbon Footprint.” Industry Week (October 16).

Anonymous. 2019. “CESifo: EVs not the best option for reduction in on-road CO2 in Germany given power mix.” Green Car Congress (April 20). 

Katwala, Amit. 2018. “The spiralling environmental cost of our lithium battery addiction.” Wired (May 8).

Castelvecchi, David. 2021. “Electric cars and batteries: how will the world produce enough?” Nature (August 17).

McDonal, Bob. 2021. “More electric cars on the road will mean increased mining for what goes in their batteries.” CBC (Quirks & Quarks) (May 28).

# Supporters
Halvorson, Bengt. 2021. “How will California get to all-electric by 2035?” Green Car Report (January 22).

Davidson, F. Todd et al. 2018. “Switching to electric vehicles could save the US billions, but timing is everything.” The Conversation (December 4).

Graham, John D., Joshua Cisney, Sanya Carley, and John Rupp. 2014. “No Time for Pessimism about Electric Cars.” Issues in Science and Technology 31, no. 1 (Fall).

# Critics
Booker, Christopher. 2017. “It’s up Against StiffC, but the Race for Electric Cars could be our Leaders’ Maddest Green Mania Yet.” Daily Mail (August 22).

Lane, Charles. 2010. “Unaffordable at Any Speed – President Obama’s electric car subsidies are snobby and foolish.” Slate, July 30.

Stein, Ronald. 2021. “EV buyers beware – fires, scarce charging times, and parking restrictions.” CFACT (September 30).

# Recent News
De Chant, Tim. 2021. “GM recalls every Chevy Bolt ever made, blames LG for faulty batteries. Two simultaneously occurring defects will cost $1.8 billion to fix.” Ars Technica (August 23).

Woudhuysen, James. 2021. “Electric Cars are Going Nowhere Fast.” Spiked (August 6).

– Ontario
McTeague, Dan. 2020. “The Doug Ford Electric Auto Company?” Canadians for Affordable Energy (October 23).

Goldstein, Lorrie. 2017. “Green Fleet Targets Shrouded in Hypocrisy.” Toronto Sun (September 9).

– Tesla Motor
Wahlman, Anton. 2018. “Tesla Model 3 Costs More To Charge Than A Gasoline Car.” Seeking Alpha (April 1).

Peters, Eric. 2017. “Why Won’t They Send me a Tesla to Test Drive?” Eric Peters Auto (October 21).

Kristensson, Johan. 2017. “Study: Tesla Car Battery Production Releases as Much CO2 as 8 Years of Driving on Gas.” Principia-Scientific (June 20).

– Hybrids
–, “Most Hybrid Vehicles Not as Cost-Effective as They Seem, Reports Edmunds.com.” Edmunds.com, June 1, 2005.

Elton, Robert. 2004. “The Truth About Hybrids.” The Truth about Cars. November 12.

Gantert, Tom. 2011. “Chevy Volt – Costing Taxpayers Up to $250K Per Vehicle.” Michigan Capitol Confidential, December 21.

Green, Kenneth. 2011. “The Failed Chevy Volt That Just Won’t Go Away.” RealClearMarkets, November 30.

– Hydrogen
– Historical perspective

Smil, Vaclav. 2003. “No Alternative to Reality,” Tech Central Station, June 30.

Zubrin, Robert. 2007. “The Hydrogen Hoax.” The New Atlantis, Number 15, Winter 2007, pp. 9-20.

– Recent developments

Lyon, Peter. 2021. “Toyota To Launch Hydrogen-Powered Prius And Corolla In 2023.” Forbes (August 29).

McTeague, Dan. 2020. “Hydrogen! Environmentalists newest golden child.” Canadians for Affordable Energy (September 9).

Global Warming Policy Foundation. 2020. “Hydrogen: The Once And Future Fuel.” GWPF Press Release (June 19).

Green, Kenneth. 2021. “The Renewable Part of Hydrogen Is the Hype.” Frontier Centre for Public Policy (November 5).

SUGGESTED READINGS

• General
Ausubel, Jesse H. 2014. “Cars and Civilization.” William & Myrtle Harris Distinguished Lectureship in Science and Civilization, California Institute of Technology (Revised May 18).

Bradley, Robert L and Richard W. Fulmer. Energy: The Master Resource, Kendall Hunt Publishing Company, 2004, Chapter 2: Using Energy, pp. 48-55.

Brain, Marshall. “How Car Engines Work.” Howstuffworks.

The American Dream Coalition on Cars
– Automobiles & the American Dream
– Automobiles and Low Income Families
– Automobile Myths
– Congestion and the American Dream
– Automobility References and Experts

–, “Change the Name to Anti-Business Week.” The Antiplanner, February 19, 2008.

National Research Council. 2013. Transitions to Alternative Vehicles and Fuels. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.

Omi, Koji. 2009. “Alternative Energy for Transportation.” Issues in Science and Technology 25 (4), Summer.

Bradley, Robert L and Richard W. Fulmer. Energy: The Master Resource, Kendall Hunt Publishing Company, 2004, Chapter 2: Using Energy, pp. 48-55.

Canadian Petroleum Products Institute. 2012. Fuels for Life. A Discussion on Canada’s Energy Transportation Choices (Executive Summary).

• Before the Car
– Workhorse (Draft horse)
Wikipedia – Draft.

Smil, Vaclav. 2000. “Horse Power,” Nature 405: 125.

“How Equine Flu Brought the US to a Standstill.” Horsetalk, September 26, 2007.

– Urban living and pollution
Teicher, Jordan G. 2014. The Glories of 19th Century Paris (Photos), Slate (February 24).

Morris, Eric. (2007). “From horse power to horsepower.” Access, vol. 30, pp. 2-9.

Urban Pollution – Many long years ago – Carriage Horse History – Coalition for New York City Animals.

Plummer, Kevin. 2014. “Historicist: The Horse’s Reign. At the turn of the 20th century, urban life moved at the pace of the horse.” Torontoist (March 8).

Nikiforuk, Andrew. 2013. “The Big Shift Last Time: From Horse Dung to Car Smog. Lessons from an earlier energy transition.” TheTyee.ca (March 6).

Davies, Stephen. 2004. “Our Economic Past ~ The Great Horse-Manure Crisis of 1894.” The Freeman – Ideas On Liberty, September 1st.

Lee, Dwight R. 2007. “Thank You, Internal-Combustion Engine, for Cleaning up the Environment – Widespread Pollution from Horse Manure Caused Diseases and Produced Methane Gas.” The Freeman – Ideas On Liberty (October – Volume 57 – Issue 8).

Boren, Braxton. 2013. “Sounds of the City: The Colonial Era.” The Encyclopedia of Greater Philadelphia.

Gillingham, Harrold E. and Solomon Drowne. 1924. “Dr. Solomon Drowne.” The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography 48 (3): 227-250.

Gordon, William John. 1893. The Horse-World of London. The Religious Tract Society.

– Canada
Carter, Zoe. 2016. “Horse-Drawn Controversy.” Horse Canada (August 31).

Government of Ontario. “Horses: A Moving Animal.”  

• Tractors
White, William J. 2008 “Economic History of Tractors in the United States.” Eh.Net Encyclopedia of Economic and Business History.

James Pethokoukis. 2012. “What if the Tractor Had Never Been Invented” The Enterprise Blog (March 8)

National Academy of Engineering. Greatest Achievements of the 20th Century – Agricultural Mechanization – Tractor Development.

• Biomass Fuels
Several links dealing with biomass fuels are provided in lecture 8.

• Electric Car
– History
Wikipedia – The History of Electric Cars.

McFadden, Christopher. 2020. “A Brief History and Evolution of Electric Cars. The history of the electric car is much longer than you might think. In this article, we take a whistle-stop tour of the evolution of the EV.” Interesting Engineering (July 1).

Kilson, Kashann. 2016. “In 1910, Electric Cars Were the Best Vehicles on the Road. What Happened?EVs ran into Ford’s whims, Edison’s unfit batteries, big oil, and the ancient question of charging stations.” Inverse (January 4).

Barber, Megan. 2017. “Before Tesla: Why everyone wanted an electric car in 1905.” Curbed (September 22).

US Department of Energy. 2014. “The History of the Electric Car” (September 5).

GM Heritage Center – GM Electric Vehicles.

Woods, Clinton Edgar. 1900. Electric automobile its construction care and operation. H. S. Stone & Co.

Sherman, Don. 2016. “What Came Before: The Real History of the Toyota Prius.” Car and Driver (April 21).

• Varia
– Overview
Moran, Rick. 2012. “GM loses $49,000 on each Chevy Volt it sells.” American Thinker (September 10).

Foster, Peter. 2010. “The Voltswagen: The people’s car the people pay for.” Financial Post, July 28.

– Technical
Rauch, Jonathan. 2008. “Electro-Shock Therapy.” The Atlantic Monthly, July-August.

Voelcker, John. 2007. “Can plug-in hybrid electric vehicles keep the electric grid stable?” IEEE Spectrum (October 1).

Wickstrom, Doug. 2006. “Who Killed the Electric Car?” rec.arts.sf.fandom Google Group, July 14.

– Economic
Vaughan, Adam. 2010. “Figures show massive slump in UK sales of new electric cars.” The Guardian, October 21.

Taylor, Peter Shawn. 2021. “The Gas Tax is Running on Empty. How Governments Plan to Target Electric Vehicles Next.” C2C (October 5).

– Environmental
Sinn, Hans-Werner. 2019. “Are Electric Vehicles Really so Climate Friendly?” The Guardian (November 25).

Todts, William. 2019. “Yes, Electric Vehicles Really are Better than Fossil Fuel Burners.” The Guardian (November 26).

Webster, Ben. 2011. “Electric cars may not be so green after all, says British study.” The Times, June 10.

Carbon Brief. 2021. “IEA: Mineral supplies for electric cars ‘must increase 30-fold’ to meet climate goals.” (May 5).

IEA. 2021. The Role of Critical Minerals in Clean Energy Transitions (May).

– Others
Alhajji, Anas. 2017. “Forecasts of High Penetration of Electric Vehicles are Based on Flawed Calculations.” Anasalhajji.com. 

Yager, David. 2017. “Electric Vehicles No Threat To Oil Prices Anytime Soon.” OilPrice.com (July 27).

Smil, Vaclav. 2012. “Far from Electrifying.” The American Magazine, November, 26.

Brooks, Allen. 2014. “The Struggle to Mainstream Electric Vehicles.” Master Resource (July 23).

Wilson, Kea. 2021. “Will the EV Revolution Kill the Parking Reform Movement?” Streetsblog USA (April 26).

– Tesla Motor
Epstein, Alex. 2013. “With The Tesla Model S, Elon Musk Has Created A Nice Fossil Fuel Car.” Forbes (August 21).

Michaels, Pat. 2013. “If Tesla Would Stop Selling Cars, We’d All Save Some Money.” Forbes (May 28) on Tesla Motor.

Powell, Ben. 2014. “Affording Tesla the Freedom to Fail.” Washington Times (April 4).

Stockman, David. 2015. “Tesla: Bonfire Of The Money Printers’ Vanities.” David Stockman’s Contra Corner (February 21). 

• Hybrids
Koerner, Brendan I. 2008. “Tank vs. Hybrid – Is it possible that a Hummer’s better for the environment than a Prius is?” Slate.com, March 18.

Wald, Matthew L. 2005. “Hybrid Cars Burning Gas in the Drive for Power.” The New York Times, July 17.

“CNW’s ‘Dust to Dust’ Automotive Energy Report.” (“Why 100,000 Miles for Prius?,” “Hidden Cost of Driving a Prius Commentary,” etc.)

• Diesel
Brain, Marshall. “How Diesel Engines Work (Introduction).” Howstuffworks.

Brain, Marshall. “How Diesel Engines Work (Diesel Engines vs. Gasoline Engines).” Howstuffworks.

Ciulla, Vincent. “The Diesel Engine.” About.com.

Hotten, Russell. 2015. “Volkswagen: The Scandal Explained.” BBC News (December 10).

Peters, Eric. 2018. “Sniffing a Scandal.” Eric Peters Auto (July 6).

• Natural Gas
White, Bill. 2011. “The Long Road for Natural Gas Vehicles.” Alaska Natural Gas Transportation Projects (June 27).

Biello, David. 2012. “Cheap Fracked Gas Could Help Americans Keep on Truckin’.” Scientific American (April 23).

• Hydrogen
Menton, Francis. 2021. “The Idiot’s Answer To Global Warming: Hydrogen.” Manhattan Contrarian (August 12)

Constable, John. 2020. Hydrogen. The once and future fuel? Global Warming Policy Foundation.

• Related topics
“Mazda Develops New Catalyst Material Structure for Autos That Reduces Precious Metal Requirements.” Green Car Congress, October 1st, 2007.

SUGGESTED LINKS

• Experts
Eric Peters Autos

John Voelcker

• General
Vehicle Technologies Program: Advanced Vehicle Testing Activity

Advanced Vehicle Testing Activity: Overview

Advanced Vehicle Testing Activity: Related Links

OICA (International Organization of Motor Vehicle Manufacturers). 

• Car Documentaries
“Nova: Car of the Future.” (The program can be watched online here).

Who Killed the Electric Car? (Sony Pictures Classics) (Eric Peters).

“Alan Alda Scientific American Frontier: Future Car.” (a video that can be seen on the PBS Website and YouTube).

• Before the Car
Running Like Wildfire – A Study of the Most Destructive Recorded Episode of Equine Influenza in History

• Historical Perspective
“History of the Automobile” on About.com.

Cité de l’Automobile – Car Museum, Alsace France.

Canadian Automotive Museum.

• Car News and Debate
The Detroit News Auto Talk

The various editorials of “The Truth about Cars”

• Diesel Vs Gasoline
Comparing Gas and Diesel Engines

Diesel Technology Forum

• Hybrid and Electric Cars
Hybrid Cars.com

Rauch, Jonathan. 2008. “Rauch on the Volt, Risk, and Corporate Culture.” EconTalk, September 01. 

• Future Car
AutoblogGreen

Green Car Congress

Horisly’s Space: World’s First Air-Powered Cars by Toyota [Videos]

The International Journal of Hydrogen Energy

The Interview: David Sanborn Scott