Energy is our most valuable and vulnerable resource.

The accomplishments of human civilization--exploring distant planets, curing diseases--have relied on our ability to discover,harness, and conserve it. As Mark Eberhart shows in this eye-opening work, cultures flourish when energy is available and collapse when it dwindles. Now, confronted with our energy dependence and shrinking resources, our course forward is obvious. By exploring the science as well as the technological and social issues of energy, Eberhart shows how we can make real a renewable and sustainable energy future, if we can only kindle the determination to do so.

The ancient Mayan city of Tikal died out， and London nearly met the same fate in the Middle Ages， because they exhausted their local energy sources.All humankind faces a similar situation today， says Eberhart(Why Things Break)， but perhaps Americans have enough imagination to come up with alternative energy sources in time to save civilization and the planet.Unlike other commentators on the energy crisis， he steps back to consider the basic science——all the way back to the laws of thermodynamics and the principle of entropy.This discussion is enlivened by the chemistry professor's friendly tone and his gleeful recounting of early childhood experiments in creating explosives， but some readers may be understandably impatient to learn how all this background can be applied to the contemporary situation.When Eberhart， at the Colorado School of Mines， finally gets to that subject， his solution is admittedly broad.He suggests that the U.S.needs to create an “energy-industrial complex” to fully supply its needs by 2035， but offers little in the way of specific proposals beyond building more electric cars and providing economic incentives for reducing carbon dioxide emissions from factories.The science is fine， but more history and policy would have helped.

INTRODUCTION

Energy and Imagination

NATURE'S ENERGY LAWS

1：The Thinking Man's Diet

2：Diet Basics I：Nothing But Energy

3：Diet Basics II：All Energy Is Not Equal

4：Talking Thermodynamics,Thinking in Pictures：Entropy

5：The Thermodynamics of Forgetting：The Energy in Information

6：The Energy Ride：The Big Picture of Energy Metabolism

7：The Age of Atoms

8：The Age of Molecules

9：From Life to Fossil Fuels

10：Keep Cool,Man,Real Cool：Human Evolution and the Origins of Imagination

OUR ENERGY PAST

11：The Great Energy Rule：First Came Agriculture

12：A Tale of Two Cities：Wood to Burn

13：Saving the Forests：Coal to Burn

14：And There Was Light：Oil to Burn

15：Power Unleashed：Electricity

OUR ENERGY PRESENT

16：First,the Bad News

17：Now for the Good News

OUR ENERGY FUTURE

18：The Thinking Man's Energy Diet

Notes

References

Index