Customer Rating: 
Summary: Friedman's inspiring green movement
Comment: Thomas L. Friedman's new book, "Hot, Flat, and Crowded" is an excellent read for every one interested in the future of planet Earth. Friedman draws connections between different topics which make one realize the need to protect this wonderful resource, Earth, which we inhabit. "Hot" is in reference to global warming. "Flat" implies how the world is becoming smaller; primarily the internet and transportation. "Crowded" refers to human over population of the earth. Friedman shows the strong connection between technology and the progression of the human race. Throughout time, there has always been enough resources to foster the development of new technologies. However, due to the over population of this planet, and the demands of that population, our resources are dwindling. Friedman's philosophy insists that when we create new products, we intend for them to be recycled therefore reducing the need for the consumption of our natural resources for every new product. We need to act NOW to protect our home so future generations can appreciate what we had the opportunity to enjoy, mother earth.
Customer Rating: Summary: Petro Politics and Alternatives
Comment: This book extensively deals with the science and politics of energy. It describes the doomsday scenarios of staying with the current energy sources and the urgent need to go towards the alternate energies.
It is well known that oil price determines the politics of energy. Friedman describes in detail how the oil prices enrich the petro dictators in the OPEC countries and how it is funding the terrorist activities thru the Islamic fundamentalist schools in Pakistan. How Saudi Arabia is influencing the culture in the middle east thru its petro dollars. How the low oil prices enfeebles the power of the dictators while higher price makes them wag their tails. The role played by the former Saudi oil minister Ahmed Zaki Yamani in 1985 to stop protecting the oil prices and thereby caused the fall of Soviet Union. It is a surprising conclusion that the drastic drop in oil prices led to the collapse of Soviet Union.
Yamani strategized that the oil prices should not increase too much in a short period of time. Doing so will cause innovations in West in the areas of alternative energy. To bolster his point, Yamani says that the stone age did not end because the world ran out of stones, but because bronze and iron came into use.
Friedman portrays in detail about how the support for energy efficiency and alternative sources of energy in US has vacillated from time to time. Precious opportunities were squandered to build upon this strategy. Regan rolled back the average auto mileage from 27.5 to 26 and got the solar panels removed from top of the white house, in guise of giving the auto and oil Industries a boost. Clinton raised the efficiency of appliances from 10 to 13, only to be rolled back by Bush to 12. Which was later rolled back by the Courts to 12, but precious time was lost in the meantime.
The utilities spend 0.15% of their earnings on R&D. GE spends very little on innovations in the energy sector. Mainly because there is no incentive to do so. As soon as the prices at the pump come down, America forgets about the past crisis. The energy companies truly care about the floor of the oil price, not the ceiling. He cites the story of the largest Solar panel company inUS, First Solar. It tottered on the brink of bankruptcy. The company survives today because of a major German market for solar panels.
There is a big need to invest in alternative sources of energies. To lower the damage caused by carbon dioxide emissions and the consequent global warming. He maintains that the scientific evidence is beyond any doubt that the warming is being caused by our excessive fossil fuel consumption. It cannot be explained by any of the natural cycles of Earth or the Sun. When Oceans are warmed up, they release the disolved carbon dioxide. When rain forests are chopped down, it results in the same effect. This results in a positive feedback loop for more warming. A powerful quotation "Destroying a rain forest and other species rich ecosystems for profit is like burning all the paintings of the Louvre to cook dinner". Another one "The biodiversity of the planet is a uniquely valuable library that we have been steadily burning down-one wing at a time-before we even cataloged all the books, let alone read them".
Along with the clean sources, we also need a smart electric grid. The current grid is a dumb grid, a hotch potch of regional grids built without the big picture in mind. A smart grid will interact with the sensors in a smart home and make efficient usage of power. A smart grid will also raise the price of power at peak times and lower it during off peak times. The third part of the three pronged strategy is conservation of energy. We need Japan's obsession with conservation which stems from an acute sense of insecurity due to most of its imports coming from middle east.
A word of caution about alternate fuels. Corn based ethanol has been politically appealing recently, but does no good in the long run. Due to the spike in food prices it causes, along with more green house gases. He further quotes that EU has declared that the bio for biofuels should not come from tropical forests, nature reserves, wetlands, or grasslands with high biodiversity.
It was revealing to me as to why the hybrids give significantly more mileage. It is mainly because the idling engine consumes 20-30 times more fuel than when it is moving. I had my own doubts about plug-in hybrids, which got cleared by this book. It says that although the plug-in hybrids draw power from an outlet, it is still more efficient to generate power at a remote coal plant than in a car engine.
Europe has been seeing the writing on
The Wallb more clearly. Iceland relies on hydro ad geothermal energy. Denmark has significant wind energy, Germany has solar energy, and France has nuclear energy. Even Australia, which initially did not sign the Kyoto protocol, did so when Kevin Rudd won the election by making environmentalism as a major election issue.
There have been pockets of hope in US. For example, in 2007, Mayor Bloomberg, the most environmentally conscientious mayors in America, passed a law requiring all cabs in New York City to be hybrids in the next five years. The state of California has been in forefront of conservation and alternate fuels. Its per capita energy consumption has remained flat in the last 40 years, the rest of the country has more than doubled. Hopefully, the incoming new administration will take cues !
