Earth Materials and Resources

Dutch (U. of Wisconsin) presents a two-volume encyclopedic work containing some 120 articles describing geological resources and related issues of their study and utilization. Topically, the alphabetical entries cover economic resources, energy resources, igneous rocks, land and soil, metamorphic rocks, minerals and crystals, petroleum geology and engineering, resource use and environmental impacts, and sedimentary rocks. Appendixes include a glossary, a bibliography, information on energy production and consumption, the Mohs scale of mineral hardness, and the periodic table of elements. First published in in 2001, it has here been revised to reflect changes in human usage of earth materials and resources (e.g. the growing importance of lithium and other rare earth elements used in consumer electronics and the emergence of "fracking" for oil and natural gas). Annotation c2013 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)