Actions by individuals and households to reduce carbon-based energy consumption have the potential to change the picture of U.S. energy consumption and carbon dioxide emissions in the near term. To tap this potential, however, energy policies and programs need to replace outmoded assumptions...

Front Matter -- Contents -- Preface -- 1 Consumption as a Problem for Environmental Science -- 2 Toward a Working Definition of Consumption for Environmental Research and Policy -- 3 Tracking the Flows of Energy and Materials -- 4 Examining the Driving Forces -- 5 Strategies for Setting Research...

To achieve the level of greenhouse gas emissions reductions called for by climate change experts, officials and policy analysts may need to develop an unfamiliar category of regulated entity: the consumer. Although industrial, manufacturing, retail, and service sector firms undoubtedly will...

In this article, we explore the implications of this literature for understanding the relationship between climate change policies and consumption. We identify a number of ways in which accounting for the implications of the new happiness literature could lead to laws and policies that influence...