Overview
"In this book, Joseph Huber investigates the life cycle analysis of technological and environmental innovations (TEIs). TEIs are new technologies, products and practices which have benign environmental effects and which can increase eco-efficiency. More importantly, they can also improve 'metabolic consistency', thus laying the foundations for a sustainable industrial ecology." It will prove valuable reading for academics and students of the social and technical sciences with an interest in environmental technology. Researchers and practitioners of industrial innovation will also gain useful insights, as will policymakers and environmental analysts in government, businesses and NGOs.Synopsis
A prime challenge of the time, says Huber (economic and environmental sociology, Martin-Luther U., Germany) is achieving ecologically sustainable living standards with a decent level of affluence for all of the six to eight billion people on the planet. He argues that technology life cycle analysis explains why a viable solution must be conceived in terms of ecological modernization, based on scientific research and technology, controlled by market economies and apt administration, and aimed at changing the structure of industrial metabolism to re-embed it into nature's metabolism. Within these constraints, he discusses features of—rather than surveys—technological environmental innovations, that is new technologies, products, and practices that are of particular importance to solving urgent environmental problems. Annotation ©2004 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR