This book is the leading how-to resource for electric car conversions. It combines Brown's years of professional automotive experience with down-to-earth language even an automotive beginner can understand. It is not written for the engineer in the laboratory, but for the home mechanic building his own car, and for the average person behind the wheel. Brown speaks to the reader as if talking to a friend in his garage. Before lifting a wrench, Brown answers the most frequently asked questions about electric cars: how fast will it go, how far will it go, how long will the batteries last, how pollution-free is it really, and many more. The conversion process itself begins with choosing an appropriate donor chassis, and stripping it of internal combustion components. Here Brown's experience provide numerous tips and tricks to make the later conversion process easier and more successful. Step by step, Brown leads the reader through the conversion. As each component comes up, Brown gives a little background on the different types available, and the pros and cons of each. He includes tips on layout, design and fabrication at each step, and discusses different approaches for different chassis, such as front wheel drive vs. rear wheel drive. By the end of the book, every part of the conversion process has been discussed. Brown wraps up with a procedure for testing and troubleshooting, and guidelines for normal driving, charging, and maintenance. The book is salted heavily throughout with photos and diagrams to illustrate its topics, and it includes a very thorough index. CONVERT IT has been chosen by the Department of Energy and by numerous schools across the country as the textbook for high school electric car conversion projects.

In the 1970s a small group of unknown southern California visionaries, working independently as a result of their own whims and hobbies, developed an interest in lightweight low-powered machines. Recognizing their talent, a gifted scientist and engineer named Paul MacCready subsequently pulled them together to build a plane capable of winning a long-standing prize for human powered flight. Their success in that project led to a series of even more efficient vehicles: a man-powered plane that flew the English Channel; a solar powered plane that flew from Paris to London; a solar-powered car that won a race across Australia; an 18-foot flapping wing flying replica of a pterodactyl for a Smithsonian-sponsored IMAX film; and more recently, a high-altitude unmanned solar airplane that, when fully operational, will stay up for six months at a time performing the same functions as orbiting satellites. Paul Ciotti tells the story of the individuals who made up this group, their inspirations and failures, their quirks and disagreements and their remarkable successes. But ultimately More with Less is about Paul MacCready himself, an American dreamer whose tough minded inventiveness altered our scientific skyline. Inviting comparison to works such "Longitude" and "The Map that Changed the World," "More With Less" takes us directly to the intersection of biography and intellectual discovery.

For more information on this title, including student exercises, please visit , http://www.people.ex.ac.uk/DAColey/

Energy and Climate Change: Creating a Sustainable Future provides an up-to-date introduction to the subject examining the relationship between energy and our global environment. The book covers the fundamentals of the subject, discussing what energy is, why it is important, as well as the detrimental effect on the environment following our use of energy. Energy is placed at the front of a discussion of geo-systems, living systems, technological development and the global environment, enabling the reader to develop a deeper understanding of magnitudes.

Learning is re-enforced, and the relevance of the topic broadened, through the use of several conceptual veins running through the book. One of these is an attempt to demonstrate how systems are related to each other through energy and energy flows. Examples being wind-power, and bio-mass which are really solar power via another route; how the energy used to evaporate sea water must be related to the potential for hydropower; and where a volcano’s energy really comes from.

With fermi-like problems and student exercises incorporated throughout every chapter, this text provides the perfect companion to the growing number of students taking an interest in the subject.

In this timely book, Gwyneth Cravens takes an informed and clarifying look at the myths, the fears, and the truth about nuclear energy.

With concerns about catastrophic global warming mounting, it is vital that we examine all our energy options. Power to Save the World describes the efforts of one determined woman, Gwyneth Cravens, initially a skeptic about nuclear power, as she spends nearly a decade immersing herself in the subject. She teams up with a leading expert in risk assessment and nuclear safety who is also a committed environmentalist to trace the path of uranium—the source of nuclear fuel—from start to finish. As we accompany them on visits to mines as well as to experimental reactor laboratories, fortress-like power plants, and remote waste sites normally off-limits to the public, we come to see that we already have a feasible way to address the causes of global warming on a large scale.

On the nuclear tour, Cravens converses with scientists from many disciplines, public health and counterterrorism experts, engineers, and researchers who study both the harmful and benign effects of radiation; she watches remote-controlled robotic manipulators unbolt a canister of spent uranium fuel inside a “hot cell” bathed in eerie orange light; observes the dark haze from fossil-fuel combustion obscuring once-pristine New Mexico skies and the leaky, rusted pipes and sooty puddles in a coal-fired plant; glimpses rainbows made by salt dust in the deep subterranean corridors of a working nuclear waste repository.

She refutes the major arguments against nuclear power one by one, making clear, for example, that a stroll through Grand Central Terminal exposes a person to more radiation than a walk of equal length through a uranium mine; that average background radiation around Chernobyl and in Hiroshima is lower than in Denver; that there are no “cancer clusters” near nuclear facilities; that terrorists could neither penetrate the security at an American nuclear plant nor make an atomic bomb from its fuel; that nuclear waste can be—and already is—safely stored; that wind and solar power, while important, can meet only a fraction of the demand for electricity; that a coal-fired plant releases more radiation than a nuclear plant and also emits deadly toxic waste that kills thousands of Americans a month; that in its fifty-year history American nuclear power has not caused a single death. And she demonstrates how, time and again, political fearmongering and misperceptions about risk have trumped science in the dialogue about the feasibility of nuclear energy.

In the end, we see how nuclear power has been successfully and economically harnessed here and around the globe to become the single largest displacer of greenhouse gases, and how its overall risks and benefits compare with those of other energy sources.

Power to Save the World is an eloquent, convincing argument for nuclear power as a safe energy source and an essential deterrent to global warming.

Mention the Galápagos Islands to almost anyone, and the first things that spring to mind are iguanas, tortoises, volcanic beaches, and, of course, Charles Darwin. But there are people living there, too — nearly 20,000 of them. A wild stew of nomads and grifters, dreamers and hermits, wealthy tour operators and desperately poor South American refugees, these inhabitants have brought crime, crowding, poaching, and pollution to the once-idyllic islands. In Plundering Paradise, Michael D'Orso explores the conflicts on land and at sea that now threaten to destroy this fabled "Eden of Evolution."

The Plot to Save the Planet is an illuminating and inspiring look at the “conspiracy” to make green technology the Silicon Valley of the twenty-first century. How is this new frontier being shaped? Brian Dumaine is your guide in this intriguing look into the very near future. You’ll read about:

• The savvy investors: Why Warren Buffett is investing heavily in wind power, and why John Doerr, the venture capitalist and early backer of Google, is saying that “green tech is bigger than the Internet and could be the biggest economic opportunity of the twenty-first century.”

• The cars of the future: The competitively priced plug-in hybrids that will get 60 miles to the gallon, and the battle being waged by fifteen start-ups competing to capture the electric car market.

• The fuels without fossils: New sources of energy from plants that could capture a big chunk of the $300 billion U.S. wholesale gasoline market.

• The corporate mavericks: Companies such as Duke Energy and GE, who are creating the low-carbon business models of the future, as well as cleaner ways to provide our power needs.

The developed world, increasingly aware of “inconvenient truths” about global warming and sustainability, is turning its attention to possible remedies—eco-efficiency, sustainable development, and corporate social responsibility, among others. But such measures are mere Band-Aids, and they may actually do more harm than good, says John Ehrenfeld, a pioneer in the field of industrial ecology. In this deeply considered book, Ehrenfeld challenges conventional understandings of “solving” environmental problems and offers a radically new set of strategies to attain sustainability.

 

The book is founded upon this new definition: sustainability is the possibility that humans and other life will flourish on Earth forever. There are obstacles to this hopeful vision, however, and overcoming them will require us to transform our behavior, both individually and collectively. Ehrenfeld identifies problematic cultural attributes—such as the unending consumption that characterizes modern life—and outlines practical steps toward developing sustainability as a mindset. By focusing on the “being” mode of human existence rather than on the unsustainable “having” mode we cling to now, he asserts, a sustainable world is within our reach. (20080930)

Winning Our Energy Independence shares energy solutions from S. David Freeman, a man who has spent his life at the forefront of energy policy.

"The Sky's Not Falling!" is the balanced alternative to Scholastic's fear-inducing global warming kids' book. Debuting the same day as celebrity wife Laurie David's "Down-to-Earth Guide to Global Warming,""The Sky's Not Falling!" is for parents sick of seeing their kids indoctrinated by has-been politicians and Hollywood stars. "The Sky's Not Falling!" is everything Scholastic's book should be: fact-filled, apolitical, fun and optimistic about the future of our magnificent, ever-changing planet. In "The Sky's Not Falling!" author Holly Fretwell, a natural resources management expert, shows kids 9-12 that human ingenuity combined with an "enviropreneurial" spirit will lead us to a bright environmental future, not one where people ruin the earth.

Parents confronted by Photoshopped pictures of drowning animals and faux "documentaries" will embrace a book that educates rather than manipulates. Holly Fretwell brings real credentials to the debate, giving kids the scoop, not just about global warming, but the real-world consequences of the Left's responses to it.

R. Buckminster Fuller is regarded as one of the most important figures of the 20th century, renowned for his achievements as an inventor, designer, architect, philosopher, mathematician, and dogged individualist. Perhaps best remembered for the Geodesic Dome and the term "Spaceship Earth," his work and his writings have had a profound impact on modern life and thought.Critical Path is Fuller's master work—the summing up of a lifetime's thought and concern—as urgent and relevant as it was upon its first publication in 1981. Critical Path details how humanity found itself in its current situation-at the limits of the planet's natural resources and facing political, economic, environmental, and ethical crises. The crowning achievement of an extraordinary career, Critical Path offers the reader the excitement of understanding the essential dilemmas of our time and how responsible citizens can rise to meet this ultimate challenge to our future.

A fun, engaging illustrated workbook for every child who wants to make a difference for the world! Following the tried and tested methodology of his acclaimed Low Carbon Diet, environmental change pioneer David Gershon guides children through a series of action steps that can impact both climate change and the environment as a whole. The book's core message is one of empowerment. Taught by a series of animal characters, each of its 46 action lessons illustrates in clear, accessible language exactly how a simple change in the child's behavior can positively impact the environment. The book's pilot program, which engaged 4,000 children in schools across the country, was praised by teachers, students and parents alike as an invaluable resource that empowers kids with the precious knowledge that they have the power to take the future into their own hands. If you have children, nieces, nephews or students, you've probably seen the convern they feel for what is happening to our environment. Now, they have a program to help them translate that convern into concrete action, and feel the heroism of being part of the solution. Join the growing number of Americans who have decided to take global warming into their own hands.

"The best way to understand the dramatic transformation of unknown books into bestsellers, or the rise of teenage smoking, or the phenomena of word of mouth or any number of the other mysterious changes that mark everyday life," writes Malcolm Gladwell, "is to think of them as epidemics. Ideas and products and messages and behaviors spread just like viruses do." Although anyone familiar with the theory of memetics will recognize this concept, Gladwell's The Tipping Point has quite a few interesting twists on the subject.For example, Paul Revere was able to galvanize the forces of resistance so effectively in part because he was what Gladwell calls a "Connector": he knew just about everybody, particularly the revolutionary leaders in each of the towns that he rode through. But Revere "wasn't just the man with the biggest Rolodex in colonial Boston," he was also a "Maven" who gathered extensive information about the British. He knew what was going on and he knew exactly whom to tell. The phenomenon continues to this day—think of how often you've received information in an e-mail message that had been forwarded at least half a dozen times before reaching you.Gladwell develops these and other concepts (such as the "stickiness" of ideas or the effect of population size on information dispersal) through simple, clear explanations and entertainingly illustrative anecdotes, such as comparing the pedagogical methods of Sesame Street and Blue's Clues, or explaining why it would be even easier to play Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon with the actor Rod Steiger. Although some readers may find the transitional passages between chapters hold their hands a little too tightly, and Gladwell's closing invocation of the possibilities of social engineering sketchy, even chilling, The Tipping Point is one of the most effective books on science for a general audience in ages. It seems inevitable that "tipping point," like "future shock" or "chaos theory," will soon become one of those ideas that everybody knows—or at least knows by name. —Ron Hogan

The bestselling author of Emotional Intelligence and Primal Leadership now brings us Ecological Intelligence—revealing the hidden environmental consequences of what we make and buy, and how with that knowledge we can drive the essential changes we all must make to save our planet and ourselves.

We buy “herbal” shampoos that contain industrial chemicals that can threaten our health or contaminate the environment. We dive down to see coral reefs, not realizing that an ingredient in our sunscreen feeds a virus that kills the reef. We wear organic cotton t-shirts, but don’t know that its dyes may put factory workers at risk for leukemia. In Ecological Intelligence, Daniel Goleman reveals why so many of the products that are labeled green are a “mirage,” and illuminates our wild inconsistencies in response to the ecological crisis.

Drawing on cutting-edge research, Goleman explains why we as shoppers are in the dark over the hidden impacts of the goods and services we make and consume, victims of a blackout of information about the detrimental effects of producing, shipping, packaging, distributing, and discarding the goods we buy.

But the balance of power is about to shift from seller to buyer, as a new generation of technologies informs us of the ecological facts about products at the point of purchase. This “radical transparency” will enable consumers to make smarter purchasing decisions, and will drive companies to rethink and reform their businesses, ushering in, Goleman claims, a new age of competitive advantage.

That climate change is happening is now all too clear. Many of us want to take action to reduce our carbon dioxide emissions. Yet the lack of a consolidated source of reliable information on how to calculate ones individual emissions and the difficulty in assessing different options for effectiveness and cost savings has proven to be a major stumbling block. But personal actions to reduce carbon emissions, if replicated on a sufficient scale, might just save the planet.

How to Live a Low-Carbon Life provides the first comprehensive, one-stop reference guide to calculating individual carbon emissions and it lays out clear plans for how individuals can reduce their emissions. Covering all aspects of modern life from transport to home heating to food sources and the vexing issue of vacations, the book provides easy-to-use tables for conducting a personal lifestyle carbon audit.

Easy reference tables enable rapid carbon footprint calculations, and a companion website houses downloadable spreadsheets to facilitate a complete lifestyle carbon audit as well as up-to-the minute information on new products and carbon-reducing technologies.

This is the most comprehensive guide to calculating and reducing individual and home carbon emissions. It provides all the information needed for people and families to understand their impacts on the worlds climate. It gives us the information to enable us to adjust lifestyles and live a responsible life.

Written in an optimistic tone, How to Live a Low-Carbon Life shows how easy it is to take responsibility and reduce our personal carbon emissions.