Earth: The Sequel: The Race to Reinvent Energy and Stop Global Warming [Hardcover]

Miriam Horn (Author), Fred Krupp (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 17, 2008

How to harness the great forces of capitalism to save the world from catastrophe.

The forecasts are grim and time is running out, but that's not the end of the story. In this book, Fred Krupp, longtime president of Environmental Defense Fund, brings a stirring and hopeful call to arms: We can solve global warming. And in doing so we will build the new industries, jobs, and fortunes of the twenty-first century.

In these pages the reader will encounter the bold innovators and investors who are reinventing energy and the ways we use it. Among them: a frontier impresario who keeps his ice hotel frozen all summer long with the energy of hot springs; a utility engineer who feeds smokestack gases from coal-fired plants to voracious algae, then turns them into fuel; and a tribe of Native Americans, for two thousand years fishermen in the roughest Pacific waters, who are now harvesting the fierce power of the waves themselves.

These entrepreneurs are poised to remake the world's biggest business and save the planet—if America's political leaders give them a fair chance to compete.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Environmental Defense Fund president Krupp and journalist Horn proffer a business-centric prescription for alleviating climate change, coupling the market force of capitalism with technological innovation and entrepreneurial inventiveness. The authors argue in favor of strict federal carbon caps, which would induce innovators to explore new ways to control carbon dioxide emissions. The book notes the global and historical successes of cap and trade mechanisms, such as the Clean Air Act of 1990. Designed specifically to control sulfur dioxide (which causes acid rain), the Clean Air Act cut emissions 30% more than the law required by providing coal plant operators with a financial incentive to modernize. New technologies that would benefit from such a logical, elegant, market-based approach include one as basic as an Arizona natural gas power plant that vents its smokestack waste into a vast greenhouse, where it nourishes algae used for manufacturing biodiesel, and one as a radical as harnessing the kinetic energy of molecules as a power source. This optimistic book brims with similar ideas, balancing jargon-heavy science with engaging profiles of individuals who are blending business and science in an attempt to save the planet. (Mar.)
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Review

If you're worried that the world is heading toward climatic catastrophe, here's a book to lift your spirits. -- Harvard Business Review

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 288 pages
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company; 1st edition (February 17, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0393066908
• ISBN-13: 978-0393066906
• Product Dimensions: 6.6 x 0.9 x 9.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (61 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #729,099 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

106 of 109 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Inspiring -- lots of creativity and business opportunity March 5, 2008

By Kira

Format:Hardcover

This book is a forward-looking, hope-filled preview of how we'll generate energy in the coming decades.

I follow environmental and energy issues closely, but a lot in here was new to me. I had no idea that solar technology is getting so sophisticated. And people are finding so many ways to make energy -- from algae and plants, from wind, from waste. Imagining a world without oil and coal is a lot easier for me after reading this.

The book is also a tour of the newest wave of start-up companies. I'm a veteran of the first dot-com boom, so the passion and excitement of these inventors was fun to see. They come from all sorts of backgrounds, and I liked hearing about the difficult problems they're solving.

Some of them will fold, but some of them will hit the jackpot. My brother is looking for new business ventures and is exploring renewable energy projects -- I marked a good half-dozen pages for him to get ideas from!

77 of 79 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Stop Global Warming. Grow Our Economy. March 4, 2008

By Samuel Parry

Format:Hardcover

This book is a must read for everyone interested in the possibilities of our clean energy future and the necessity of stopping global warming.

We have been stuck in a national debate between the doomsayers who warn of the serious threats of global warming and the naysayers who deny global warming is real and are blocking national action.

This book resets the conversation. There is a world of possibility ready to explode with smart national policies that reward low-carbon energy innovation. It's up to us to take this message of hope to decision makers in Washington to pass smart national policy to unleash the innovators.

Absolute must read on the future of national energy policy and solutions.

23 of 24 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A Must Read! March 14, 2008

By Josh Goren

Format:Hardcover

Writer Miriam Horn could make a common shopping list engaging and enlightening. We are all lucky that she has not squandered her talent on shopping lists, but has, along with Fred Krupp, written an informative and fascinating account of the exciting work being done to save us from our own excesses. The stories in the book will make you reconsider the dark idea that perhaps the human race is getting what it deserves. This is a vitally important book to buy and a total pleasure to read.