More booklists

Laws of physics

Professor Tom Murphy, at the University of California, San Diego has a free textbook showing the math and physics of why renewables can’t replace fossil fuels: “Energy and Human Ambitions on a Finite Planet. Assessing and Adapting to Planetary Limits“.

Overviews

1. C Hall. Energy & the Wealth of Nations: Understanding the Biophysical economy 
2. Alice Friedemann. When Trucks stop running: Energy and the future of transportation.
   
3. Alice Friedemann. Life After Fossil Fuels: A Reality Check on Alternative Energy.
   
4. M Inman. The Oracle of Oil: A Maverick Geologist’s Quest for a Sustainable Future
5. J. Perlin, A Forest Journey: The Role of Wood in the Development of Civilization, 2005.
6. C. Ponting, A New Green History of the World: The Environment & the Collapse of Great Civilizations, 2007
7. R. Heinberg. The End of Growth. Adapting to our New Economic Reality. 2011.

Energy Returned on Energy Invested (EROEI)

1. P Prieto & Charles A. S. Hall. 2013. Spain’s Photovoltaic Revolution. The Energy Return on Investment. Springer.
2. D Murphy. The Net Hubbert Curve: What Does it Mean? 2009.
3. J Lambert. EROI of Global Energy Resources Preliminary Status and Trends.  State  University of New York, College of Environmental Science and Forestry. 2012.
4. C Hall. What is the Minimum EROI that a Sustainable Society Must Have? 2009.
5. C Hall. Energy Return on Investment: A Unifying Principle for Biology, Economics, and Sustainability
6. D Murphy, Energy return on investment, peak oil, and the end of economic growth, 2011.

Peak Oil

1. Peak Oil is Here! World oil production peaked in 2018 (and 2nd chapter of Life After Fossil Fuels)
   
2. German peak oil report: Armed Forces, Capabilities and Technologies in the 21^st Century Environmental Dimensions of Security. PEAK OIL Security policy implications of scarce resources. Bundeswehr Transformation Centre, Future Analysis Branch. 2010.
3. R Heinberg. Afterburn: Society Beyond Fossil Fuels
4. K. Cobb. The only true metric of energy abundance: The rate of flow. 2013.
5. R. Hirsch.  Peaking of World Oil Production.  Department of Energy. 2005.

Tar Sands & Heavy Oil

• A Nikiforuk. Tar Sands: Dirty Oil and the Future of a Continent 

Peak Coal

1. Wang, J. September 4, 2013. Chinese coal supply and future production outlooks [peak likely in 2024]. Energy 60: 204-214.
2. R. Heinberg. The End of Cheap Coal. Nature 468. 18 Nov 2010.
3. A. Friedemann. Coal: why it can’t easily substitute for oil. 2011.
4. T. Patzek. A global coal production forecast with multi-Hubbert cycle analysis.  Energy. 2010.
5. R. Heinberg. Blackout. Coal, Climate and the Last Energy Crisis. 2009
6. A. Friedemann. Peak Coal is already here or likely by 2020 — if true — IPCC 100 year projections too high? 2013.
7. New York Academy of Sciences. Full cost accounting for the life cycle of coal.  2011 pp 73-98
8. R. Heinberg. Blackout. Coal, Climate and the Last Energy Crisis  2009

Peak Natural Gas

1. D Hughes. Oct 27, 2014. Drilling Deeper. A reality check on U.S. government forecasts for a lasting tight oil & shale gas boom.  PostCarbon
2. B Powers. Cold, hungry, and in the Dark: Exploding the Natural Gas Supply Myth. 2013
3. D. Hughes. April 28, 2015. Has Well Productivity Peaked in the Nation’s Largest Shale Gas Play? Postcarbon.org
4. SBC. October 2014. Factbook Natural Gas. [20-40% of recoverable resources are low EROI Sour Gas] SBC Energy Institute
5. R Heinberg. Chapter 5 of How Fracking’s False Promise of Plenty Imperils Our Future: The Economics of Fracking: Who Benefits? October 2013.
6. A Friedemann. Shale Oil and Gas Will Not Save Us. 2012.
7. A Friedemann. Natural Gas pros and cons. 2011.

Peak Uranium

• U Bardi, Extracted: How the Quest for Mineral Wealth Is Plundering the Planet, 2014, Chelsea Green.
• Energy Watch Group, Fossil and Nuclear Fuels – the Supply Outlook, 2013
• M Dittmar, The end of cheap uranium, 2011, Institute of Particle Physics, Science of the Total Environment

Oil substitutes

• Tad Patzek. 2009. Potential for Coal-to-Liquids Conversion in the United States, Natural Resources Research 18.
• Höök, M., et al. 2014. Hydrocarbon liquefaction: viability as a peak oil mitigation strategy. Philosophical Transactions. Series A: Mathematical, physical, and engineering science, 372
• Höök, M. & Aleklett, K. 2010. A review on coal-to-liquid fuels & its coal consumption. International journal of energy research Vol. 34 10:848-864
• Gray, D., et al. August 1, 2012.  Topic Paper #8 Production of Alternative Liquid Hydrocarbon Transportation Fuels from Natural Gas, Coal, and Coal and Biomass (XTL). National Petroleum Council
• NPC. 2012. Natural Gas. Topic Paper #21. An Initial Qualitative Discussion on Safety Considerations for LNG Use in Transportation. National Petroleum Council

Nuclear Power

• Rosenbaum. 2011. How the End Begins: The Road to a Nuclear World War III
• Alice Friedemann. 2017. Why Nuclear Power is not an alternative to fossil fuels, 2017, energyskeptic.com
• Mark Cooper, Renaissance in reverse: competition pushes aging U.S. nuclear reactors to the brink of economic abandonment, 2013, Institute for Energy and the environment
• H. Hirsch. Nuclear reactor hazards. Ongoing dangers of operating nuclear technology in the 21st century. 2005.
• GB Jaczko. Confessions of a Rogue Nuclear Regulator

Nuclear Waste

• William Alley, et al., Too Hot to Touch: The Problem of High-Level Nuclear Waste, 2013, Cambridge University Press
• A Nuclear spent fuel fire at Peach Bottom in Pennsylvania could force 18 million people to evacuate, 2017
• R. Alvarez. Spent Nuclear Fuel Pools in the U.S.: Reducing the Deadly Risks of Storage   Institute for Policy Studies May 2011
• Cochran et al. It’s time to give up on breeder reactors. Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.  May / June 2010
• Michael Dittmar. The Future of Nuclear Energy: Facts and Fiction (4 parts) http://europe.theoildrum.com/node/5631

Kerogen a.k.a. Shale Oil

1. A. Friedemann. Shale Oil Overview. 2011.
2. R. Udall. The Illusive Bonanza: Oil Shale in Colorado. 2005.

Methane Hydrates

1. A. Friedemann. Why we aren’t mining methane hydrates now. Or ever. 2014.
2. C. Nelder. Are Methane Hydrates Really Going to Change Geopolitics?  The Atlantic.  2013.
3. Office of Naval Research Science & Technology. Fiery ice from the Sea. 2002.

Books about Energy

• V Smil. Energy and Civilization A History
• V Smil. Energy Transitions: History, Requirements, Prospects.
• L Margonelli. Oil on the Brain: Adventures from the Pump to the Pipeline
• V Smil. Power Density: A Key to Understanding Energy Sources and Uses
• V Smil. Natural Gas: Fuel for the 21st Century
• V Smil. Energy: A Beginner’s Guide

IPCC models assume exponential consumption of fossils until 2400

Other scientists who realize that we are on the cusp of energy decline have plugged in realistic amounts of fossils and found we don’t have enough oil, coal, or natural gas left for a hothouse 8.5 future, at worst 4.5 to 5.5 for 500 to several thousand years.

Tang, X. 2013. Depletion of fossil fuels and anthropogenic climate change: a review. Energy Policy, 52: 797-809

Short term solutions for energy decline

• R. L. Hirsch. Peaking of World Oil Production: Impacts, Mitigation, & Risk Management       2005
• Howard Bucknell III.  Energy and the National Defense. 1981
• Department of Energy.  Standby Gasoline Rationing Plan. 1980

Alice Friedemann  www.energyskeptic.com  Author of Life After Fossil Fuels: A Reality Check on Alternative Energy; When Trucks Stop Running: Energy and the Future of Transportation”, Barriers to Making Algal Biofuels, & “Crunch! Whole Grain Artisan Chips and Crackers”.  Women in ecology  Podcasts: WGBH, Jore, Planet: Critical, Crazy Town, Collapse Chronicles, Derrick Jensen, Practical Prepping, Kunstler 253 &278, Peak Prosperity,  Index of best energyskeptic posts

FYI, I have two articles published on biofuels here:

• Sheila Newman (ed)   The Final Energy Crisis           2008
• Jacqueline Langwith, ed.        Opposing Viewpoints: Renewable Energy, vol. 2      2008