Physicist and writer, born in Washington, District of Columbia, USA. He studied at Harvard and Oxford, and resigned a physics research fellowship at Merton College, Oxford, to work for Friends of the Earth. A consultant on energy issues, he published widely on energy and other environmental matters, including Non-Nuclear Futures (1975), which he co-wrote. In 1982 he became director of research for the Rocky Mountain Institute in Old Snowmass, CO. He wrote a syndicated newspaper column on environmental issues and was also a published poet.
Amory Bloch Lovins (born November 13, 1947 in Washington, DC) was trained in physics and has worked professionally as an environmentalist. Lovins' works include Factor Four with Hunter Lovins and Ernst Ulrich von Weizsäcker, and Natural Capitalism with Hunter Lovins and Paul Hawken.
Lovins has been one of the most influential American voices advocating a "soft energy path" for the U.S. and other nations. He has advocated energy-use and energy-production concepts based, on one hand, on conservation and efficiency, and on the other, on the use of renewable sources of energy and on generation of energy at or near the site where the energy is actually used.
Life and work
Lovins spent much of his youth in Silver Spring, Maryland and in Amherst, Massachusetts.
But, having become a devotee to Snowdonia National Park, in northwest Wales, Lovins was lured out of academia. During this time his interests settled specifically into the area of resource policy, and most especially, energy policy. paper grew into his first book concerned with energy, World Energy Strategies.
Back in the U.S., Lovins guided mountaineering trips in the White Mountains of New Hampshire. The shock of the 1973 energy crisis helped create an audience for his ideas, and he appealed to this new audience with the publication of his 10,000-word essay "Energy Strategy: The Road Not Taken?"
Lovins (not quite 29 at this point) described the "hard energy path" as involving inefficient liquid-fuel automotive transport, as well as giant, centralized electricity-generating facilities, often burning fossil fuels (e.g., coal or petroleum) or harnessing a fission reaction, greatly complicated by electricity wastage and loss. The "soft energy path" which he wholly preferred involves efficient use of energy, diversity of energy production methods (and matched in scale and quality to end uses), and special reliance on "soft technologies" (also known as alternative technology) such as solar, wind, biofuels, geothermal, etc. One of his main concerns, was the danger of committing to nuclear energy to meet a society's energy needs.
By 1978 Lovins had published six books, consulted widely, and was active in energy affairs in some 15 countries, as synthesist and lobbyist.
Amory Lovins was elected a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 1984.
Working with many specialists, Lovins's more recent work at RMI has focused on efforts to transform sectors including the automobile (they designed a hydrogen-powered "hypercar" to provide an example to Detroit), electricity, water, semiconductor, and real estate.
Quotes
"The average [television-program] viewer can save thousands of dollars a year added to your discretionary income by bringing the waste out of the energy and water you use in your house, how you travel, what you buy and you can do good for yourself and the Earth at the same time and improve your quality of life by making more careful choices."Books
Books authored or co-authored by Amory Lovins:
Winning the Oil Endgame: Innovation for Profit, Jobs and Security (2005) ISBN 1-84407-194-4 (Available Online in PDF) The Natural Advantage Of Nations: Business Opportunities, Innovation And Governance in the 21st Century (2004) ISBN 1-84407-121-9 Small Is Profitable: The Hidden Economic Benefits of Making Electrical Resources the Right Size (2003) ISBN 1-881071-07-3 Natural Capitalism: Creating the Next Industrial Revolution (2000) ISBN 1-85383-763-6 Energy Unbound: A Fable for America's Future (1986) ISBN 0-87156-820-9 Brittle Power: Energy Strategy for National Security (1982 re-released in 2001) ISBN 0-931790-28-X (Available Online in PDF) Soft Energy Paths: Towards a Durable Peace (1977) ISBN 0-06-090653-7 Harvard Business Review on Business and the Environment Factor Four: Doubling Wealth - Halving Resource Use: A Report to the Club of Rome A Road Map for Natural Capitalism World Energy Strategies: Facts, Issues, and Options Non-Nuclear Futures: The Case for an Ethical Energy Strategy Energy/War: Breaking the Nuclear Link The Energy Controversy: Soft Path Questions and Answers The First Nuclear World War: A Strategy for Preventing Nuclear Wars and the Spread of Nuclear Weapons Nuclear power: Technical Bases for Ethical Concern Least-Cost Energy: Solving the C02 Problem Openpit Mining
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