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Energy Demand and Climate Change: Issues and Resolutions
Duke engineer Franklin Hadley Cocks writes: "Global warming will pluck the strings of Nature's many instruments, but we may not like the melody they play. Much has been said about climate and interdependence of civilization and energy. Numerous writings advocate particular aspects of the problems that climate change and energy shortages will cause. Some people take the position that there is no problem at all."
Cocks' book presents facts--both scientific and engineering rules of the game--that govern the chess match now underway between humanity and nature, so that you may judge for yourself what is happening and the validity of the various positions being advocated. Science and engineering truths are independent of political viewpoint or vested interest. Each chapter also includes a suggested reading section.
Part I Questions
Part I gives an overview of the human use of energy as it has evolved through the ages as well as the astronomical and atmospheric factors that have dominated our planet's climate. Earth's slow but inevitable orbital changes have an enormous and long-term influence on global climate, especially the periodic onset of ice ages. Humanity's ever-expanding consumption of energy has contributed greatly to the betterment of living standards, which depend critically on fossil fuels, whose supply is not infinite. Earth's nuclear fuel resources are large, but making use of them generates its own special problems. 
Chapter 1: Ancient Days and Modern Times
Chapter 2: Ice Ages - Past and Future
Chapter 3: Global Warming Versus Returning Glaciers
Chapter 4: Earth's Fossil Fuel Supply
Chapter 5: Nuclear Power
Part II Answers
Part II presents energy options that can be called into being with the technology that exists right now. Increased efficiency of energy usage and energy from renewable resources including wind, sunlight, and many offers offer a variety of possibilities, each having different potentials and limits.
Chapter 6: Solar Energy
Chapter 7: Wind, Waves, and Tides
Chapter 8: Going with the Flow: Water, Dams, and Hydropower
Chapter 9: Geothermal Energy: Energy from the Earth Itself
Chapter 10: Efficiency, Conservation, and Hybrid Cars
Chapter 11: Energy Storage: Macro to Micro
Chapter 12: Green Fuel: Biodiesel, Alcohol, and Biomass
Part III Dreams
Part III discusses the energy and climate-changing possibilities that are only dreams now but might someday come to be. Thermonuclear fusion, breeding nuclear fuel, artificial changes in planetary albedo, magnetohydrodynamic electricity production, power from ocean thermal and salinity gradients, and other technologies are possible. Each of these also has both potentials and limits.
Chapter 13: Breeding Nuclear Fuel
Chapter 14: Nuclear Fusion: Engine of the Sun
Chapter 15: Power from the Ocean: Thermal and Salinity Gradients
Chapter 16: Fuel Cells: Hydrogen, Alcohol, and Coal
Chapter 17: Magnetohydrodynamics and Power Plants
Chapter 18: Thermionics and the Single Fuel Home
Chapter 19: Artficial Photosynthesis and Water Splitting
Chapter 20: Planetary Engineering and Terraforming
Chapter 21: Space Solar Power: Energy and the Final Frontier
Part IV Nightmares
Part IV offers a glimpse of the devastating energy and climate possibilities that might envelop us if we just keep going along the way we are.
Chapter 22: Alternative Futures
The mission of Duke's Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science educational programs is to provide the knowledge, skills, and credentials needed to be successful in the practice of engineering; the preparation necessary to undertake professional registration; an educational preparation for graduate or professional study; and an education background that is the basis for professional growth and leadership throughout a career that may encompass a broad range of endeavors, both technical and non-technical.