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Energy Security: Evolution of a Concept

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The Palgrave Encyclopedia of Global Security Studies
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Introduction

The concept of energy security can be traced back to the prehistoric age when early humans started to control fire. The survival of many early human settlements totally depended on relatively easy and uninterrupted access to flammable materials such as wood. It is very likely that early human groups somehow considered availability, affordability, and resilience of flammable materials in its survival strategies (Valentine 2011). Interestingly enough, similar considerations regarding modern forms of energy resources can be employed in a contemporary concept of energy security as well.

Historical Overview

Even though energy has always been a crucial part of human life, the first attempts to conceptualize, measure, and address energy security in its contemporary sense were made only in the twentieth century when energy security received special attention from energy policy scholars and professionals. The increasing attention to the issue of energy security was primarily caused...

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Further Reading

  • Klare, M. T. (2004). Blood and oil: The dangers and consequences of America’s growing petroleum dependency (1st ed.). New York: Metropolitan Books/Henry Holt.

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  • Yergin, D. (1991). The prize: The epic quest for oil, money, and power. New York: Simon & Schuster.

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Correspondence to Aliaksandr Novikau .

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Novikau, A. (2020). Energy Security: Evolution of a Concept. In: Romaniuk, S., Thapa, M., Marton, P. (eds) The Palgrave Encyclopedia of Global Security Studies. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-74336-3_491-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-74336-3_491-1

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