The second edition of this popular textbook has been extensively revised and brought up-to-date with new chapters addressing energy storage and off-grid systems. It provides a quantitative yet accessible overview of the renewable energy technologies that are essential for a net-zero carbon energy system. Covering wind, hydro, solar thermal, photovoltaic, ocean and bioenergy, the text is suitable for engineering undergraduates as well as graduate students from other numerate degrees. The technologies involved, background theory and how projects are developed, constructive and operated are described. Worked examples demonstrate the simple calculation techniques used and engage students by showing them how theory relates to real applications. Tutorial chapters provide background material supporting students from a range of disciplines, and there are over 150 end-of-chapter problems with answers. Online resources, restricted to instructors, provide additional material, including copies of the diagrams, full solutions to the problems and examples of extended exercises.

The second edition of this popular textbook has been extensively revised and brought up-to-date with new chapters addressing energy storage and off-grid systems. It provides a quantitative yet accessible overview of the renewable energy technologies that are essential for a net-zero carbon energy system. Covering wind, hydro, solar thermal, photovoltaic, ocean and bioenergy, the text is suitable for engineering undergraduates as well as graduate students from other numerate degrees. The technologies involved, background theory and how projects are developed, constructive and operated are described. Worked examples demonstrate the simple calculation techniques used and engage students by showing them how theory relates to real applications. Tutorial chapters provide background material supporting students from a range of disciplines, and there are over 150 end-of-chapter problems with answers. Online resources, restricted to instructors, provide additional material, including copies of the diagrams, full solutions to the problems and examples of extended exercises.

The second edition of this popular textbook has been extensively revised and brought up-to-date with new chapters addressing energy storage and off-grid systems. It provides a quantitative yet accessible overview of the renewable energy technologies that are essential for a net-zero carbon energy system. Covering wind, hydro, solar thermal, photovoltaic, ocean and bioenergy, the text is suitable for engineering undergraduates as well as graduate students from other numerate degrees. The technologies involved, background theory and how projects are developed, constructive and operated are described. Worked examples demonstrate the simple calculation techniques used and engage students by showing them how theory relates to real applications. Tutorial chapters provide background material supporting students from a range of disciplines, and there are over 150 end-of-chapter problems with answers. Online resources, restricted to instructors, provide additional material, including copies of the diagrams, full solutions to the problems and examples of extended exercises.

This chapter examines the regulation of renewable energy in Australia, with a specific focus on wind energy. Renewable energy is rapidly progressing and evolving and represents a crucial component of our approach to greenhouse gas reduction and the transition towards a sustainable, low-carbon society. The chapter examines the broader regulatory frameworks for renewable energy at both the state and federal levels. It reviews how the legal system supports the development of renewable energy as well as a transitioning energy framework. To this extent, the chapter examines the Renewable Energy (Electricity) Act 2000 (Cth), the operation of the renewable energy target and the role that the various clean energy bodies have assumed in implementing this framework. It considers some of the economic implications for the energy transition. The nature of wind farming and the regulatory principles and best practices standards for South Australia and Victoria are reviewed.

The top priority in addressing climate change is to reduce net emissions of greenhouse gases to zero as swiftly as possible. Among the policy instruments for achieving this goal: carbon markets and carbon taxes; subsidies and incentives for energy conservation and for developing renewable energy technologies; building a new network of advanced nuclear reactors to provide carbon-free energy; imposing restraints on deforestation and planting large numbers of new trees; developing powerful new technologies for removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere; incentivizing private citizens to reduce the carbon footprint of their lifestyles; and introducing new governmental policies for decarbonizing national economies. By combining all these strategies, humankind could realistically reach net zero emissions by the middle years of this century. From that point forward, it can start actively removing existing accumulations of carbon dioxide, eventually bringing global warming to a halt and reversing some of the damage that’s already been done.

Taking conflicts over new solar energy projects on the agricultural landscape in the global North as its backdrop, the chapter demonstrates how work and labour (including that performed in the North by workers from the global South) are erased both by the opponents and the proponents of such projects. The erasure is consistent with prevailing ways of knowing the human-environment nexus, shaped by an underlying political economy derivative of how international law has constructed and maintained the foundational liberal mythology that separates labour from land. Grounded in our commitment to pursuing a ‘just transition’ to decarbonisation – that is to say, a transition that attends to the distributional effects and disproportionate impacts of decarbonisation on workers and communities – we strive to reconceptualise work and labour as embodied practices of working and living on the land. Everyday socio-spatial practices structured by law implicate ordinary people in the making of landscapes and continuing relations of settler capitalism, shaping how ‘we’ live together on the land, including who belongs and who gets to decide.

Social-ecological transitions are fundamentally about places – especially how place meanings and attachments act as lenses for interpreting change. Our chapter focuses on energy transitions in rural agricultural landscapes in New York. Agricultural place meanings underpin attachment for many residents, but are challenged by proposals for large-scale renewable energy development. This chapter explores how people interpret these proposed facilities using the perspective of social representations of place. multiple interpretations of proposed facilities are promoted by different groups based on their position towards the development: developers and energy advocates strategically portray solar installations as ‘farms’, replete with images they believe support agricultural meanings; those who resist these developments emphasise the large-scale industrialisation of the landscape and the loss of services such as open space and amenity value. These narratives of place contribute to understanding perspectives on energy transitions and broader rural change.

This chapter introduces the reader to the main global energy issues. It starts by illustrating the fundamental role of energy in modern societies, and it continues by outlying the key energy challenges facing the globe as a result of rising demand for energy. Among these, particular attention is devoted to climate change, energy access in developing countries and energy security.

This chapter focuses on modern renewable energy sources such as solar, wind, and marine energy. For each technology option, the chapter outlines the fundamental technological aspects and the key global production and consumption trends. By doing so, the chapter also assesses the cost dimension of the various sources, by presenting the evolution of global levelized costs of electricity in the last decade. The chapter also discusses the applicability of renewables to both centralised and distributed power systems, and outlines the importance of digital technologies in facilitating the integration of variable renewable energy sources into the grid. The chapter concludes with an outline of the barriers to renewable energy implementation and of the strategies to address them.

Local governments play an important role in China’s economy, and many studies credit local governments with a beneficial role in promoting growth over the past decades, especially in manufacturing. The extensive literature on Chinese innovation is relatively silent, however, on the impact of Chinese local governments on industrial upgrading. This chapter’s empirical focus is local government influence on the ecosystem for innovation in clean energy manufacturing industries, specifically solar cells (PVs) and electric vehicles (EVs). While innovation in the clean energy sector has been a key theme of the government’s response to environmental degradation and climate change, clean energy manufacturing is perhaps foremost an industrial policy. Moreover, subnational governments remain core actors through their dual role as promoters of local development and conduits of central policy initiatives. Sometimes central and local goals align favorably for firm innovation, and sometimes they conflict. In the sectors studied, local government efforts to promote upgrading has occurred in niche areas, notably in the low-speed electric vehicle sector. Yet local government efforts often have been wasteful –promoting excessive market entry and questionable incentive schemes –falling short of goals for upgrading.