Energy in a Finite World [antikvár]

FOREWORD Two realities are clear: • The difficulties associated with supplying and using energy are not temporary; they will continue, and we must learn to deal with them. • The energy problem is inherently global; no nation is untouched, nor can any act in isolation. Yet while the energy problem goes beyond the 20th century and transcends national borders, analyses tend to follow suit only selectively. Short-term pressures seldom permit the luxury of concentrating as much on the year 2020 as on 1985, or of being truly global in an analysis. Still, opportunities do arise. This report summarizes the results of a seven-year study conducted at the hiternational Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) in Laxenburg, Austria. The work, which involved over 140 scientists from 20 countries, aimed to provide new and critical insights into the international long-term dimensions of the energy problem. Given this objective, the 50-year period from 1980 to 2030 was analyzed in detail, though parts of the study looked even further into the future. Geographically, all countries of the world were included -developed and developing, market and centrally planned economies. The results are described in Energy in a Finite World: Paths to a Sustainable Future published in 1981 by the Ballinger Publishing Company, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA; more detail is provided in a second volume also from Ballinger: Energy in a Finite World: A Global Systems Analysis. The picture that emerges is one of a world facing, during the 1980—2030 period, what is anticipated to be the steepest ever increase in its population. At the same time, the developing regions of the world, in which most of this population growth will occur, will be trying to close the economic gap separating them from the developed regions. Despite the resultant strains on the world's