ABSTRACT
It takes energy to produce materials. It takes materials to produce energy. To fully appreciate the linkages between materials and energy is a complicated and dynamic issue. So far, the fields of research and policy on energy and on materials are quite separate, and little attention has been paid to their linkages. Some suspect that there may be large consequences if we did pay attention, and that it would significantly change prospects and forecasts of energy and material demand if these linkages were acknowledged. Therefore it is worthwhile to gain a more in-depth understanding of the energy–materials nexus, to better support these respective policies. This chapter contains an exploration of the mutual linkages between energy and materials, their dynamics and their importance. In the second section, we’ll briefly describe the developments in the two fields separately. The energy requirements of material production are explored in the third section, both qualitatively and quantitatively. In the fourth section, the focus is on material requirements for energy production. The fifth section touches upon the feedback loops between the energy and the materials system. In the final section, we present a research agenda for the energy–materials link.
