This book is a Primer about energy generation and its use in our industrial society. A majority understand that the energy generation that supports our current way of life also threatens major environmental impact. Though our situation is not imminently apocalyptic, we will have our lives significantly compromised unless we begin to deal with the challenges that our energy generation is causing. With a basic technical understanding of energy, society can make more informed decisions about its generation and use.
The book introduces energy. It describes how it’s generated, where it’s used and considerations for making it sustainable and decarbonized. Today, 80% of energy continues to be from carbon-containing fossil fuels – coal, oil and natural gas . The book sketches how this fossil energy is converted into the work used for electricity, transportation and food. It describes how sustainable energy from sun and wind is more efficient and potentially cheaper. However, sustainable energy is difficult to store, which is a major unresolved problem in the transition from fossil fuels to sustainable energy. The book provides the scientific tools to begin to understand such problems and discusses approaches to make the energy system decarbonized. This book does not tell the reader which options to take, rather it provides the literacy to choose.
Edward L. Cussler, Distinguished Institute Professor at the University of Minnesota, was educated at Yale (BE, 1961) and Wisconsin (PhD, 1965). After thirteen years at Carnegie-Mellon University, Cussler joined the University of Minnesota in 1980. He has written over 250 articles and five books, including Diffusion, Bioseparations, and more recently, Chemical Product Design. Cussler, who served the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE) as President, was awarded the Colburn (1975) and Lewis (2001) awards, and was the Institute Lecturer (2014). He holds honorary doctorate degrees from the Universities of Lund (2002) and Nancy (2007). Cussler is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and a member of the National Academy of Engineering. His current research interest is the production of ammonia from stranded wind energy, that is, “putting wind energy in a bottle.”
Abhoyjit S. Bhown is a Senior Program Manager at the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) in Palo Alto, California. He holds degrees in chemical engineering (BS 1982, Auburn; MS 1983, California Davis; and PhD 1990, Minnesota) and in mathematics (MS 1989, Minnesota). At EPRI since 2007, he leads a team of scientists and engineers focused on carbon management, including novel power cycles, CO2 capture, and CO2 storage. The effort spans computational, laboratory, bench, field pilot studies, and engineering designs. Prior to EPRI, he founded and led start-up companies for separations technologies, and worked at research institutes and energy companies. Most of his research has focused on separations technologies.
