ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the flow of material and energy resources through our economic system, using water and energy resources as illustrations of the steps and alternative approaches to resource management. The debate over resource management policy between technical optimists, or "cornucopians," and technical pessimists, or "neo-Malthusians," has heated up considerably. The search for new deposits of non-renewable resources is becoming progressively more difficult, expensive, and hazardous. The United States is developing and investing in seabed mining and seawater resource extraction technologies. Improvements in mining and processing technologies, such as the development of machinery for large-scale strip mining, have allowed the acquisition of progressively lower grade deposits or resources without significant cost increases. The materials balance model provides a useful framework for analysis of alternative methods of resource and residuals management. The model indicates that the production-consumption-waste flow of resources can be managed through the control of throughput.
