In an era when pressing environmental problems make collaboration across the divide between sciences and arts and humanities essential, this book presents the results of a collaborative analysis by an anthropologist and a physicist of four key junctures between science, society, and environment. The first focuses on the systemic bias in science in favour of studying esoteric subjects as distinct from the mundane subjects of everyday life; the second is a study of the fire-climax grasslands...

A fully comprehensive introduction to smart grid standards and their applications for developers, consumers and service providersThe critical role of standards for smart grid has already been realized by world-wide governments and industrial organizations. There are hundreds of standards for Smart Grid which have been developed in parallel by different organizations. It is therefore necessary to arrange those standards in such a way that it is easier for r...

Though sustainable development goals and other international initiatives have insisted on the importance of energy access in peace building, there is still little understanding about the extent to which energy systems themselves can contribute to or mitigate structural violence. While there are ample relevant examples globally from a diverse literature and increasing body of case studies, this knowledge has not been systematically organized to show theoretical alternatives to current energ...

The volume presents innovative approaches to improving energy access in underprivileged communities. A core theme is the use of previously underutilized or unrecognized resources that can be found through synergies in supply and value innovation, novel financing methods, and the use of leapfrog technologies. The contributors illustrate how decentralized approaches and small-scale localized solutions can promote climate change mitigation and adaptation and increase the resiliency of vulnera...

This book is open access under a CC BY-NC-ND license.Ambassadors are a kind of vehicle and bellwether for globalization. These diplomatic envoys serve as pivotal contact points between nations across a wide range of fields, from economics and culture to health and the environment. The special group of ambassadors in this book – those based in Beijing – are at the forefront of what for many countries is one of their most important bilateral relationships, as well one of the most str...

In the past thirty years, China has transformed from an impoverished country where peasants comprised the largest portion of the populace to an economic power with an expanding middle class and more megacities than anywhere else on earth. This remarkable transformation has required, and will continue to demand, massive quantities of resources. Like every other major power in modern history, China is looking outward to find them. In By All Means Necessary, Elizabeth C. Economy and ...

A briefing book published annually by the Foreign Policy Association with eight background articles on various foreign policy topics. This book is the basis for a nationwide discussion program.

In recent years, China and India have become the most important economic partners of Africa and their footprints are growing by leaps and bounds, transforming Africa's international relations in a dramatic way. Although the overall impact of China and India's engagement in Africa has been positive in the short-term, partly as a result of higher returns from commodity exports fuelled by excessive demands from both countries, little research exists on the actual impact of China and India's g...

Energy is crucial to the functioning of any human society and central to understanding East Asia’s ‘economic miracle’. The region’s rapid development over the last few decades has been inherently energy-intensive and the impact on global energy security, climate change and the twenty-first-century global system generally is now very significant and will become more so over foreseeable years and decades to come. The region is already the world’s largest energy consumer and greenhouse gas em...

The urban metabolism framework maps the activities of cities from their consumption of materials, the different activities associated with those processes, and the wastes produced. Information generated provides a diagnostic tool for identifying high waste generating or inefficient activities and identifying potential points of policy intervention. The streamlined approach surmounts the lack of city level data, which is often cited as the most significant limitation preventing material flo...

This is an open access book.The subject of this book is to provide down-to-earth information on what kind of actions are being taken by the Government, Local community, Businesses, Researchers, NGOs on the energy transition in this region. It gives an updated picture of the energy transition in the East Asian countries, where the economic growth, as well as CO2 emission growth, is significant.This book focuses not only on the technological perspective of the energy transiti...

Contributing to the emerging literature on the geopolitical and foreign policy implications of decarbonisation and energy transition processes, this book sheds light on the future of the European Union’s (EU) external relations under decarbonisation.Under the Paris Agreement on climate change, adopted in 2015, governments are committed to phasing out the emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases over the coming decades. This book addresses the many questions around thi...