8:00 PM–9:40 PM, Thursday, November 9, 2006
Williamsburg Hospitality House - Empire A/B
Chair: Thomas Clegg, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
8:00 PM–8:50 PM
Rajan Gupta
(Los Alamos National Laboratory)
Energy is essential for modern life and is a critical resource that we take for granted.~ Unfortunately, we are increasingly confronted by many unsettling questions: Is there enough cheap oil and gas remaining and should we start changing our life styles towards energy efficiency?~ What will be the price of oil and gas next year and will we face shortages?~ Are rising prices reflective of greed and manipulation or geopolitics or of real constraints?~ Will renewable sources provide a significant fraction of our energy needs? Is global warming already happening and is it a result of our ``addiction to oil''?~ If the answer to these is ``yes'', then what can we, as individuals, do to help ourselves, the nation, and the world?~ This talk will attempt to answer these questions by examining the global oil, gas and other resources, emerging constraints and opportunities, and geopolitics.