Books & ideas

The Accumulation of Energies

Marius Bickhardt — 2025-03-11T06:30:00Z

Historian Jean-Baptiste Fressoz provides the first genealogical study of the concept of energy transition. In the face of discourses that keep postponing “the transition” to a later date, Fressoz takes up the unprecedented political challenge of a complete phase-out of fossil fuels.

King Coal

Louis Fagon — 2023-11-07T09:00:00Z

Coal is not just a raw material: it is also a symbol and a commodity whose history Charles-François Mathis has retraced over a period spanning two centuries.

Climate Solutions: Reflecting in the Heat of the Moment

Jean Bérard — 2023-04-04T09:30:00Z

How can we move away from energy-intensive growth? This question goes back a long way, and a group of historians has identified past attempts, all of which have failed, to create ecological societies. Could this provide a repertoire of ideas for the future?

Taiwan's Energy Security Challenges

Floriano Filho — 2020-05-14T07:00:00Z

Taiwan faces multiple energy security challenges. While the relationship with mainland China is a difficult one, the island almost exclusively relies on imports. To cope with international political instability, the Taiwanese energy policy has been under continuous revision and updating.

Green Money

Sébastien Duchêne — 2019-03-07T07:00:00Z

Socially responsible investment, green bonds, extra-financial rating agencies: ‘climate finance' has developed over the last few years. Without State involvement, will these tools suffice to finance the transition toward a carbon neutral global economy?

The Coal Economists

Gabriel Lombard — 2018-12-31T07:00:00Z

In the period between 1865 and 1931, economists were already questioning coal and the exploitation of “exhaustible” energies. Can their analyses shed light on the current environmental crisis?

Life, a Model for Chemists

Lucie Campos — 2014-06-02T07:30:00Z

In the context of increasing uncertainty regarding how we will source our energy in the future, the bio-inspired chemistry of carbon and hydrogen is, according to Marc Fontecave, destined to play a major role in the development of renewable energies. His laboratory, which works at the crossroads of chemistry and biology, uses biological phenomena such as photosynthesis as its inspiration in inventing new materials, new catalysts and new reactions.

An Economic Analysis of the Ukrainian Crisis

Florent Guénard & Thomas Vendryes — 2014-02-17T09:31:33Z

According to Ukrainian economist V. Vakhitov, the analyses of the Ukrainian political crisis overstate the importance of the Russian tutelage. The country is not as divided as it is said to be, between Pro-European West and pro-Russian East. Today's revolts against authorities should be seen as a larger protest against a corrupt regime.

Energy, a Lens on World Politics

Alden Young — 2012-09-14T09:14:31Z

An ambitious and encyclopedic book sheds new light on post-Cold War history. To Daniel Yergin, the rise of energy, economic and financial nationalisms throughout the world has been a grave threat to the globalized, liberal markets that guarantee the world's prosperity.