Energy: A Beginner's Guide

商家名称	信用等级	购买信息	订购本书
		Energy: A Beginner's Guide
		Energy: A Beginner's Guide

As Einstein pointed out in his famous equation, E=MC2, all matter can be described as energy. It is everywhere; it is everything. In this engaging book, prolific author and academic Vaclav Smil provides an introduction to the far-reaching term and gives the reader a greater understanding of energy's place in both past and present society. Starting with an explanation of the concept, he goes on to cover such exciting topics as the inner workings of the human body, and the race for more efficient and environmentally friendly fuels. With global warming becoming a mainstream political issue, this guide will help shed light on the science behind it and efforts to prevent it, and how our seemingly insignificant daily decisions affect energy consumption. Whether you're after insight or dinner table conversation, "Energy: A Beginner's Guide" will amaze and inform, uncovering the science behind one of the most important concepts in our universe.

网友对Energy: A Beginner's Guide的评论

The first chapter is tedious. I never did fully internalize some of the more esoteric concepts in college, such as mols and joules, and still don't, but the rest of the book is chuck full of amazing data and factoids.
It left me in awe of just how much we humans have come to know. Also, it puts in perspective some of the climate change issues. Just remember, there will not be a quiz and enjoy knowing that out there scientists actually understand a lot more than today's media can ever present.

This is not truly a Beginner's Guide. The book is more like an Executive Summary of the many writings by the prolific author, up to 2005. No references are given. There is no appendix with useful tables of values. However, there are many useful tables, lists and values dispersed throughout the book. The book has a few flubs: confusing ultra-violet radiation with infrared, missing a "per year" in a sentence, and draft animals pulling with kg of force.

Some more serious problems occur on page 152, where the parenthetical definition of "net energy ratio" is actually the the definition of EROI, energy return on investment (of energy). The numbers discussed in the remainder of the paragraph are actually values of 1- 1/EROI . A true beginner would be flummoxed.

Another grievance is that the difference between installed capacity of wind power and the actual production of electrical power is not emphasized forcefully enough. A wind production number is given on page 169 (as a percent of world electrical power), but you are on your own to figure out the important capacity factor, and then to put wind power in a fair comparison with nuclear power and coal power. The summary of wind energy is otherwise excellent, as is the summary of photosynthesis and biofuels. All ethanol fans should read it.

The focus of the book in not renewable energy policy. The scope is much more grand, all done wonderfully in consistent S.I. Units, with respect for the intelligence of the reader. The author gets to the point. Energetics is the most concise way to organize knowledge of your universe. The brilliant author summarizes nearly all of it in 176 pages: your cells, your home economics, your technology, your planet. For larger scale solar and galactic - you may need to shop elsewhere. Presentation of energetics leads to implications in the sociology of jet travel, urban planning, and history of science and technology. For example, on page 93 we learn how the celebrated inventor James Watt delayed progressive development of the steam engine.

The book would be a great investment of time and money if a better book was not available: "Energy in Nature and Society", published by Smil in 2008. That book has more figures, of better quality, appendices and approximately 3 times the amount of text. The overlap in not complete, though. You won't find that tidbit about Watt in the 2008 work, or the fact that swarms of insects soiling the leading edge of wind turbine blades can cause a nearly instant drop in power production by up to 20%.

Great book to grasp the fundamentals of energy. I recommend to anyone without formal education on energy who wants to know its roots, some formulas and easy to understand etymology.

Feels productive on your ride to work. I work in renewables industry so its a good brain wakeup.

I do not normally read this type of book. For that reason I followed A Year of Books . I did read learning books that I normally do not read. This book was rather interesting. It was all about energy.

喜欢Energy: A Beginner's Guide请与您的朋友分享,由于版权原因，读书人网不提供图书下载服务

查看更多 下一篇