Peak Oil Caucus chairs Bartlett, Udall comment on National Petroleum Council report

Last week, the National Petroleum Council released its new report, "Facing the Hard Truths about Energy," stressing the increased development of alternative energy sources in order to meet global energy demand -- a demand that will likely not be met solely through global oil and gas production. During today's E&ETV Event Coverage, Reps. Roscoe Bartlett (R-Md.) and Tom Udall (D-N.M.), co-chairmen of the Congressional Peak Oil Caucus, discuss the NPC report and explain why they believe it hides the truths about global energy.

And here's the blurbage for Charlie's book...

Making World Development Work is about economic development and its relation to population, environment and resource issues in less affluent countries. These essays presented here criticize the way most large development projects are designed and conducted and are written by professionals from a broad range of disciplines involved in current development research.

Making World Development Work explains why overly simplistic economic models of development have led to many failures and unnecessary environmental destruction. The editors contend the preferred method of development is through a systematiic process that integrates the natural sciences with economics and one that is based on scientific method instead of ideology.

Leclerc and Hall review the logical and methodological basis of neoclassical economics and its application to development. They provide a series of historical perspectives, including less developed countries that have improved successfully and others that have not been as successful. They complete the demonstration with a portfolio of current development research innovations in the social and economic sciences as well as in the natural sciences, including a new logical basis for economics called biophysical economics.

Making World Development Work offers new ways to consider development including the limitations of cheap energy, environmental degradation, and human population growth as the fundamental issues for any economic model that can have any hope of working in the future.

About the Authors

Grégoire Leclerc is senior scientist with the Centre de Coopération Internationale en Recherche Agronomique pour le Développement (CIRAD). Charles A. S. Hall is professor of environmental and forest biology at SUNY, Syracuse. He is the author of more than 200 publications and author or editor of seven books including Quantifying Sustainable Development: The Future of Tropical Economies.