Durwin Striplin, Ph.D., Chemistry, Davidson College
The development of modern civilization can be a tale about the availability of practical energy resources and the ingenious technologies we have devised to extract and use them. Our advancements, especially in the areas of health and longevity of life, correlate directly with our energy use. Still, our growing global addiction to energy has led to a query about what it has cost us regarding the world’s atmosphere and climate.
This leads us to pertinent questions centered on the topic of energy that could be explored in this series of seminars:
- 1. What is energy? What are the different flavors and forms of energy?
- 2. What is the history and current status of energy use, production, and transportation?
- 3. What are the projected energy needs of the planet in the future? How can we project the scale of such a need so students can understand the sheer scale of the energy we may require in the future?
- 4. What technologies will be available that can scale to meet future global energy requirements? Can we provide all our energy needs with sustainable technologies alone?
- 5. What is the real impact of energy conservation?
- 6. What does our energy future look like? What would an energy policy need to look like for the US now to ensure adequate energy in the future? How will we define the quality of life as we move towards a planet that might contain 9 billion people, all vying for the planet’s energy resources?
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