Internal Combustion: How Corporations and Governments Addicted the World to Oil and Derailed the Alternatives

Black, Edwin

ISBN 10: 0312359071 / ISBN 13: 9780312359072

Published by St. Martin's Press, 2006

About this Item

Signed on the title page by Edwin Black, this copy is remaindered with clean tight pages and some edge wear to the dust cover. Seller Inventory # BC59

Bibliographic Details

Title: Internal Combustion: How Corporations and ...

Publisher: St. Martin's Press

Publication Date: 2006

Binding: Hardcover

Condition: Very Good

Dust Jacket Condition: Good

Signed: Signed by Author

Edition: First Edition.

About this title

Synopsis:

Author Edwin Black has mined scores of corporate and governmental archives to assemble thousands of previously uncovered and long-forgotten documents and studies into this dramatic story. Black traces a continuum of rapacious energy cartels and special interests dating back nearly 5,000 years, from wood to coal to oil, and then to the bicycle and electric battery cartels of the 1890s, which created thousands of electric vehicles that plied American streets a century ago. But those noiseless and clean cars were scuttled by petroleum interests, despite the little-known efforts of Thomas Edison and Henry Ford to mass-produce electric cars powered by personal backyard energy stations. Black also documents how General Motors criminally conspired to undermine mass transit in dozens of cities and how Big Oil, Big Corn, and Big Coal have subverted synthetic fuels and other alternatives. The story comes full-circle to the present day oil crises, global warming and beyond. Black showcases overlooked compressed-gas, electric and hydrogen cars on the market today, as well as inexpensive all-function home energy units that could eliminate much oil usage. His eye-opening call for a Manhattan Project for immediate energy independence will help energize society to finally take action.

Review:

"Enthralling.... By the time the author makes his final impassioned plea for a bold new solution to the world's energy crisis, he has already made his case with devastating clarity." Publishers Weekly (Starred Review)"