Energy Production and Management in the 21st Century

Discussing the future of energy production and management in a changing world, this book contains selected papers presented at the 2nd International Conference on Energy Production and Management in the 21st Century: The Quest for Sustainable Energy. Developed societies require an ever increasing amount of energy resources, which creates complex technological challenges. The challenge in many cases is the conversion of new sources of energy into useful forms such as electricity, heat and fuel while finding efficient ways of storing and distributing energy. Equal challenges lie with the production of such renewable energy at an acceptable cost, including damage to the environment, as with integration of those resources into the existing infrastructure. The book deliberates the energy use of industrial processes, including the imbedded energy contents of materials, such as those in the built environment. Energy production, distribution and usage, result in environmental risks, which need to be better understood. They are part of the energy economics and relate to human environmental health as well as ecosystems behaviour.