Energy-related Resources Research Articles

From energy privilege to energy justice: A framework for embedded sustainable development

Addressing concerns of justice related to energy has gained increased international attention with the adoption of the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals. However, scholarship has largely neglected connections between the concepts of sustainable development and energy justice, and offers few related evaluative tools. Moreover, the dominant energy development paradigm—what I term ‘energy privilege’—has received limited attention and theoretical grounding. By critically engaging theory from Karl Polanyi with concepts from environmental justice and political theory, the article develops a framework to differentiate between ‘embedded’ and ‘disembedded’ sustainable development. This framework is then applied to develop a set of principles and criteria by which energy projects, initiatives, and systems can be assessed in terms of contributing to energy justice as compared to energy privilege. The resulting framework focuses on how energy-related resources, rights, and representation take shape across the three interlocking spheres of sustainable development: the economic, the environmental, and the social. It provides a practicable tool for communities and decision-makers to evaluate the extent to which individual projects and broader energy systems are both just and sustainable.

Designing an integrated knowledge graph for smart energy services

The sharp growth of distributed energy-related resources requires an efficient energy management for future grids. The traditional power grid that highly depends on information model standards collects energy data depending on them and creates energy services. Nowadays, decentralized grids utilize information schema generated by reusing standards as well as existing schemas. The schema helps implement smart energy services in the future grids. To meet such requirements, domain experts proposed upper-level schemas that manage a wide range of energy-related knowledge resources. However, their schemas could not conduct an effective reuse of energy-related knowledge resources due to their unsuitable schema development methodologies. Moreover, there is a lack of vocabularies that satisfy critical requirements for decentralized grids. To cope with these problems, we propose an energy knowledge graph (EKG) as an upper schema for the integration of knowledge resources in energy systems. First, we utilize the existing methodology that offers guidelines for reusing existing knowledge resources. Second, EKG supports concepts of energy trading and communities to satisfy the requirements of decentralized grids. Third, EKG presents compliant concepts that are compatible with existing schemas. Fourth, we modeled the use cases using the EKG and evaluated them according to the scenario specification of energy services. Last, to demonstrate the benefits of the EKG, we implemented key components such as semantic mashup and complex event processing.

The Role of Islam and Natural Resources in Current Mali Political Turmoil

In the recent times, the Republic of Mali has been striving to restore peace and harmony in the state. The conflict initiated by insurgent Islamist groups fighting against the Malian government for independence in northern Mali. The revolt against the government is associated with the implementation of shariah laws. Despite the current decrepit political condition in Mali it seems to be a site of attraction of Western military intervention. This paper studies the role of religion and natural resources in the conflict. Mali is one of the poorest countries in the world but in reserve it has one of the largest amounts of mineral deposits including uranium and other energy related resources. The significance of this paper is that it critically analyses the legality, motives and purpose of French intervention in Malian conflict and direct US support for it. DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2013.v4n6p507

Geologia Economica de Mexico (Second Edition)

Kenneth F. Clark, Guillermo A. Salas-Piza, and Rodolfo Cubillas-Estrada, Editors. Pp. 953. Asociacion de Ingenieros de Minas, Metalurgistas y Geologos de Mexico, A.C., Servicio Geologico Mexicano. 2009. Hardcover (in Spanish). This volume, the second of a series entitled Geologia Economica de Mexico , includes a total of 110 short descriptions of a broad range of commodities in Mexico. Nonmetallic and energy-related resources occupy the first one-third of the book and cover just about everything from the more common and important fluorite, barite, gypsum, halite, and celestite deposits to more unusual materials such as wollastonite, clays, amber, diatomite, pumice, graphite, rutile, and gems. Energy-related resources such as geothermal, coal, coal methane, oil, and uranium, are covered briefly. The second part of the volume covers mostly nonferrous metalliferous deposits, as well as iron deposits that are discussed extensively. Precious metal- and base metal-bearing deposits, which are the main interest of most exploration geologists, occupy about one-half of the volume. Although the descriptions are short and …

Working Within the Environmental Regulatory Process

Recent trends in environmental regulations are analyzed with respect to the pipeline industry. With the historical precedent established by the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) of 1969, the pipeline industry is now subject to numerous Federal and state regulations to protect the environment. Two strategies are identified that can be mutually beneficial for both government and industry. The first, cooperative involvement with the regulatory agency, is discussed and advantages identified and illustrated with examples. The second, more controversial, involves public involvement or participation in preconstruction planning. With an increase in pipeline construction and a demonstrated concern for increased governmental regulation of environmental and energy-related resources, the regulatory process will continue to expand in scope and depth.