Balanced, broad-based, and up to date, this comprehensive text explores the nature and critical issues of earth resources and the impacts that resource usage has on the earth environment. The authors assume little to no scientific background, and you'll find full coverage of all major types of earth resources--energy, metallic, nonmetallic, water, and soil.

About the Author: James R. Craig received his BA degree from the University of Pennsylvania in 1962 and his M.S. and Ph. D. degrees from Lehigh University in 1964 and 1965 respectively. He spent two years as a post-doctoral fellow at the Carnegie Institution of Washington Geophysical Laboratory in Washington D.C before joining the geosciences faculty at Texas Tech University in 1967. He then moved to the Department of Geological Sciences of Virginia Tech where he remained until his retirement from teaching in 2002.

During his 32 years at Virginia Tech, he taught Resources Geology Courses to more than 15,000 students and published more than 150 research papers. With David Vaughan, he coauthored Mineral Chemistry of Metal Sulfides (Cambridge University Press 1978) and Ore Microscopy and Ore Petrography (Wiley 1981). Craig and Vaughan then coauthored the first edition of Resources of the Earth with Brian Skinner in 1988. New editions were published in 1996 and 2001; the fourth edition appears in 2010 under the title Earth Resources and the Environment.

While at Virginia Tech, Craig received the Sporn Award for best teacher of a freshman subject, was inducted into the Academy of Teach Excellence, and was awarded the Out Standing Faculty Award for the State of Virginia by Governor Mark Warner in 2002.

David Vaughan is Professor of Mineralogy and Director of the Williamson Research Centre for Molecular Environmental Science at the University of Manchester. Educated at the Universities of London and Oxford, he previously worked in Canada (at CANMET) and the USA (at MIT) before returning to the UK. His research interests centre on fundamental studies of minerals, particularly metal sulfides and oxides, and the applications of such studies to problems of Earth resources and the environment. He is (co-)author of over 250 journal publications and an author/editor of a dozen books in fields ranging from sulphide mineralogy, ore microscopy and environmental mineralogy, to mineral surface science and theoretical geochemistry. Currently Principal Editor of the magazine Elements and Associate Editor of Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta, his contributions have been recognised through the award of the Schlumberger Medal of the Mineralogical Society, and the Geochemistry Award of the Royal Society of Chemistry. He has been Distinguished Lecturer for the Mineralogical Societies both of America and Great Britain, and also served the latter as its President.

Brian Skinner was born in Australia, attended the University of Adelaide, and then entered the mining industry as the mine geologist for Aberfoyle Tin in Tasmania. After 2 years he entered graduate studies at Harvard, obtaining his PhD in 1955. His subsequent career has involved employment or consulting for various mining companies, several years as a research geochemist for the US Geological Survey and for the past 40 years serving as a faculty member at Yale University.

Skinner has published extensively, including 200 papers and 20 books. He served as editor of Economic Geology for 20 years and of International Geology Review for 14 years. He has been awarded the Penrose Medal of the Society of Economic Geologists and the Futers Gold Medal of the Institute of Mining and Metallurgy (UK). He has honorary doctorates for the Colorado School of Mines and the University of Toronto.