Matthew N. Eisler

I am a historian of the social relations of energy and materials. I write about how ideology and policy inform practices of energy/materials transformation at laboratory and industrial infrastructure scale and the effects of these practices on society and the environment. My first book (Overpotential: Fuel Cells, Futurism, and the Making of a Power Panacea, Rutgers University Press 2012) explores these themes in a history of an advanced power source. My new book (Age of Auto Electric: Environment, Energy, and the Quest for the Sustainable Car, MIT Press 2022) addresses them in a history of the contemporary electric vehicle. My current research project (Technologies of Environmental Care) investigates the history of the idea of green technology and its implications in the era of climate change.