The author, Fred Krupp, President of the Environmental Defense Fund put this book together as a plea for the US to set up a system of Carbon Cap and Trade plain and simple. No problem with that ... just make sure you understand it as you read it.

An excellent overview of companies and people who are thinking past oil. There are some good minds and ideas being put forward to solve our energy dependency problems. This book contains a good list of companies to keep an eye on.

An excellent survey of the clean-energy field as of the end of 2007. Krupp's definitely in the know regarding the financial and political aspects of these innovative solutions. Throughout his book he argues for a cap-and-trade system to stimulate more investment in clean-tech. In detail, with fascinating stories about the pioneers, Krupp covers everything going on out there - even devotes 2 pages (out of 279) to nukes. It's a truly inspiring read. Maybe there's hope after all. ( )

I don't know what it is about book sub-titles these days but they all have them, and this one generously has *two*, "The Sequel" and the common "The Race To.." (at least it's not "..That Changed the World"). I very often avoid books with these sub-titles because I know exactly what to expect: a long magazine article that would have been better in a magazine and not as a book. However in this case I took the chance because one of the co-authors is Fred Krupp, President of the influential Environmental Defense Fund. Even though it is indeed written like a magazine article (very skillfully I assume mostly by Miriam Horn) with lots of human interest stories and non-fiction narrative techniques, the content is well worth it.

Essentially it is a survey of the current technologies, companies and people involved with alternative energy in the United States. Even though I follow this stuff in the news and blogs there was tons of new stuff here I never knew about. Some of the people involved are really fascinating. Some of the companies are much further along than I realized. Others are probably not the solutions I thought they may be. My copy is marked up with people and companies to watch.

If the book has a re-curring message it is this: free markets work, but only if there is a cap and trade system to adjust the cost of fossil fuels upward, so that alternative technologies have a chance to develop and compete. If there is no cost to pollute, than obviously clean technologies are at a disadvantage. This has to change, and soon.

--Review by Stephen Balbach, via CoolReading (c) 2008 cc-by-nd ( )