Drawn from the Hoover Institution's Shultz-Stephenson Task Force on Energy Policy January 2010 conference, this book discusses critical energy issues including, energy and synthetic biology, cap and trade and carbon tax policies, energy efficiency, international energy relationships, and other key topics. The contributors present a range of ideas and recommendations that might improve the performance of the United States in responding to the energy challenge.

THE FUTURE OF RELIABLE AND SECURE ELECTRIC POWER

Providing reliable and secure electric power to meet the growing demands of this century, and mitigate the adverse effects of climate change, is a daunting challenge. The situation has given rise to increased interest in the potential for distributed power systems (DPS): a combination of distributed sources of power production and distributed energy storage. This study examines the economic, environmental, and energy security case for DPS.

Scholars from the Brookings Institution's Energy Security Initiative and the Hoover Institution's Task Force on Energy Policy offer recommendations for ensuring the security and sustainability of our electricity system now and for future generations through the greater deployment of DPS. Their report provides a comprehensive survey of the current technology and policy landscape of DPS and offers suggestions for its most effective use in civilian and military settings, along with warnings on its possible pitfalls. They discuss the current economic, environmental, and energy security costs and benefits of DPS, the policies and regulations currently in place to promote DPS and their effectiveness, the potential benefits of increased penetration of DPS and the barriers to achieving them, and what federal and state governments can do to further encourage DPS.

CONTRIBUTORS: John Banks, Jeremy Carl, David Fedor, Kevin Massy, Pedram Mokrian, Jelena Simjanovic, David Slayton, Amy Guy Wagner, Lisa Wood

There are more than 6 billion people living on Earth today, and the United Nations predicts that this number will surge to 9.1 billion by the year 2050. However, the natural resources necessary to sustain the world's population - including freshwater, arable land, and fossil fuels - are dwindling. In order to achieve sustainable development, the stress exerted on the environment by the world's population will have to be controlled through reduced rates of consumption.What steps must be taken to reduce humanity's global footprint and keep within the boundary of the planet's carrying capacity? What are the strategies that governments can pursue to reduce population growth and energy consumption and to preserve and increase the supply of freshwater and energy resources? ""Natural Resources and Sustainable Development"" explores the impact that overconsumption has had on natural resources as well as possible alternative strategies in the United States, China, India, Germany, and Brazil.