Vaclav Smil

Energy and Civilization - A History

333.7909 SMI Beaverton Library 2017

Index skimmed. I might check this out again if I need some of the data, but more likely I'll use original sources.

• p12 Energy density MJ/kg
  • Vegetables very low, grains high, oils and fats very high
  • Just the thing if I'm hiding food before a famine - not if I'm planning a healthy diet
• p13 Preindustrial northern cities required 100x wooded area for charcoal
• p253 Diesel compression ratio 14-24, efficiency 50%, Otto Cycle gasoline ratio 7-10, efficiency 25%
• p339 "junction field effect transistor invented by Shockley" ... heh

Invention and Innovation

A Brief History of Hype and Failure

600 SMI Beaverton Library 2023

Read whole book. Perhaps should have read something else.

• Inventions that turned from welcome to undesirable
• 019 Thomas Midgley Jr. (1889-1944) (antiknock) leaded gasoline, chlorofluorocarbon refrigerants
• 036 Paul Hermann Müller 1939 DDT dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane
• 066 Airships / dirigibles
  • 069 LZ-1 1900 / LZ-13 Hansa 1912 45K km 399 flights / LZ-17 bomber 1914, 77/115 shot down in 1917
  • 071 1928-1937 Graf Zeppelin 1.7M km / 1936 LZ-129 Hindenberg 1937 Lakehurst catastrophe
  • 075 recent proposals mostly vaporware

• 079 Nuclear Fission: Nautilus 1952-1955 launch --> Shippingport 1957

  • 085 Fast breeders
  • 086 power demand doubled every decade before 1970, 50% in 1970s, 33% in 1980s, 25% 1990s, 9% 2000s, no growth 2010s
  • 089 France 80% nuclear energy, lower recently (last reactor order 1991)
  • 093 Germany shut down nuclear (Green party), deployed more coal instead
• 093 Supersonic flight
  • more later