Publisher's Synopsis
The availability and use of energy underpins all human activities, and many of the current and future challenges we face can be reduced to an energy problem. Among those problems that we know of today, we find climate change, overpopulation, and food shortages. For future foreseeable problems, we consider the development of advanced propulsion systems for space travel, space colonization, and building planetary or stellar megastructures. The efficient use and production of energy will help us to overcome these problems. It is key to the future of humankind, but what is it, and how does it permeate the cosmos? How has energy use contributed to the technical development and growth of humankind over thousands of years of human history? How do we use different forms of energy today, and how can we harvest and convert energy while also scaling from a planetary level to a galactic level? As a civilization, we are facing tremendous challenges today; however, this book should serve as an inspiration and motivation for a prosperous future of humankind. Despite countless open questions and the mistakes we have made and will continue to make, we will find our way. We have always found a way.
