Our response to our energy needs will shape the future.

90 percent of our energy needs are covered by coal, oil and natural gas. Of these oil is the most critical, as it powers our entire transportation system, and there is no current substitute for it.

There is plenty of petroleum left in the world, but it is getting more expensive and harder to find. This means that over time pure economic growth, based on cheap energy, will be replaced by the pursuit of energy efficiency. This will have major economic and political consequences and will require a new national consensus replacing the ideologies of the past.

Viable Energy Now is a clear, lucid guide to this historical transition. Starting with the Industrial Revolution, it tracks our growing reliance on fossil energy down to the present situation. Currently proposed energy alternatives are reviewed. Policies for increasing and securing our fuel supply are recommended, and the initial steps in the pursuit of energy efficiency are sketched out. Economic, financial and security policies to match this effort are outlined, and the book ends with a call for the new political attitudes needed to face the energy challenge.

Some of the book’s highlights

 

· The ideological debate between Left and Right is sterile, as both ideologies are now becoming obsolete.

 

· Our economy will be powered by fossil fuels for several more decades, so a sufficient and secure supply is essential for the near future.

 

· Current “alternative” sources of energy are inadequate. Intensive research, development and evaluation of such alternatives are critical if we are to reach a truly sustainable level of energy supply.

 

· Cooperation with Russia and synthetic fuels are the two keys to energy security in the near term.

 

· The financial system cannot be “fixed’. In fact it is the problem that brought about the current crisis.

 

· Globalization is a dead end. No economic improvement will occur in the US until it is sharply curtailed.