City Travel Guides > Books > Environment

.Hot, Flat, and Crowded: Why We Need a Green Revolution--and How It Can Renew America
City Travel Guides > Books > Environment
by: Thomas L. Friedman

September 08, 2008

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.Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things
City Travel Guides > Books > Environment
by: William McDonough, Michael Braungart

April 22, 2002
For those to are ecologically minded, a key part of creating any new product is to produce a life cycle assessment (LCA), which is also known as a cradle-to-grave analysis, working from manufacture (`cradle') to use and disposal (`grave'). The LCA investigates all of the environmental impacts of that product and attempts to minimise that damage. One of the key premises of McDonough & Brangart's book, is that minimising damage just isn't good enough. Instead, the authors propose that we change our entire design processes so that reuse and nourishment are built right into the process. Instead of minimising waste, we create value. Cradle to Cradle goes beyond the notion of having recycling as the final step in a process flow, and instead builds ... Read More:
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.The World Without Us
City Travel Guides > Books > Environment
by: Alan Weisman

August 05, 2008
One of the most fascinating non-fiction titles that I have ever read in my entire life and, believe me, I have read some very good ones.

Written by Alan Weisman, an award-winning journalist, who imagines what the world would be like if all of a sudden humans vanished from the face of the earth .... but not without a trace. He uses this hypothetical scenario to talk about the changes man has brought about to earth and how long would the human creations last without us (yes, the 'trace' I was talking about).
He takes this wonderful premise as a vehicle to discuss such diverse topics as human and animal evolution, air and water pollution, animal and plant extinction, natural disasters, Mayan history, NASA's Voyager and Pioneer spacecrafts, ... Read More:
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.The Worst Hard Time: The Untold Story of Those Who Survived the Great American Dust Bowl
City Travel Guides > Books > Environment
by: Timothy Egan

September 01, 2006
Let me preface this by saying that I love reading about history. Maybe my expectations for this book were too high, but I HATED it. 50 pages, 100 pages, 150 pages in I kept fighting the urge to put the book down and forget about it, but I kept hoping that it would get better. It didn't.

This book sucks. It was awful; horribly disappointing. It dragged and dragged and dragged, and when I finally finished it I returned it to the bookstore. I will never read it again and would not recommend it to anyone. There were a couple parts that were interesting, but most of it was mind-numbingly dull. Egan went into great (and in my opinion, needless) detail of the history and mundane details of many of the families, but not the kind of detail that contributes to ... Read More:
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.Silent Spring
City Travel Guides > Books > Environment
by: Rachel Carson

October 22, 2002
The book was delivered in good condition and in a timely fashion. I am very pleased with your services.
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.The Botany of Desire: A Plant's-Eye View of the World
City Travel Guides > Books > Environment
by: Michael Pollan

May 28, 2002
In style and substance this is one of the best books I've read in recent years, as well as one of the most enjoyable. It also broadened my perspective in several areas. I highly recommend.
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.Climate Confusion: How Global Warming Hysteria Leads to Bad Science, Pandering Politicians and Misguided Policies that Hurt the Poor
City Travel Guides > Books > Environment
by: Roy Spencer

March 27, 2008
Considering that he has a PhD and has been working with NASA for a long time, the author has high credentials, unlike Mr. Gore. He explains science is still in it's primitive state, that scientists have only scratched the surface. Therefore it is highly unlikely that CO2 can be the blame. The Earth contains far too many factors to consider. What he does explain though, is that nature has it's own check & balance. When CO2 increases, temperature increases a LITTLE, but this increases water vapor. Water vapor is the gas that will form cloud, which block out the sun. This in the process prevents the sun's UV light from entering the atmosphere and reflect back to the Earth continuously with infrared, thus negating the greenhouse effect. The author also shows acute understanding of economics, ... Read More:
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.1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus
City Travel Guides > Books > Environment
by: Charles C. Mann

October 10, 2006
In this beautifully written book Charles C. Mann recollects his journey to old tribal communties in what is now America. This book holds many facts that are amazing and your idea of what the US was like before Columbus will change drastically. Charles Mann tells lost stories of lies and betrayal between the Indians and the early explorers who landed on the coast of America. Many assumptions about what the Indians were like are completely contradicted in this book, although bold at time all of the facts are true and seem to line up perfectly. Although lacking cities of gold the Americas did have sophisticated technology in some tribes, even more ahead than their un familiar rivals in Europe. Early interactions between the first people to land on the United States are extordanary and just imagine ... Read More:
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.Plan B 3.0: Mobilizing to Save Civilization, Third Edition
City Travel Guides > Books > Environment
by: Lester R. Brown

January 16, 2008
Lester R. Brown presents an excellent, comprehensive analysis and discussion of the major ecological and social challenges threatening humanity with the possibility of extinction. These include problems with oil and food supplies; climate change and rising sea levels; water shortages; depletion of natural resources; and warnings about possible tipping points in failing social and economic systems. The most concerning factor is global heating, which could reach a tipping point beyond which it would be impossible to reverse the melting of glaciers and the destruction of life as we know it on our planet.

He proposes numerous solutions for our most serious and urgent challenge, climate change, often measured in the numbers of coal-powered electricity generating facilities that could be eliminated. ... Read More:
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.Alcohol Can Be a Gas!: Fueling an Ethanol Revolution for the 21st Century
City Travel Guides > Books > Environment
by: David Blume

November 01, 2007
I work on the forefront of the biofuels industry for an engineering design firm that works with rising biofuel technologies. First let me says that I HAVE NOT read Mr. Blume's entire book. The sections that I have read, however, make some rather untrue statements. For example, in Myth #1 Blume states that oil has a negative net energy output, meaning that it requires more energy invested than it puts out. That means that it takes more than 1 barrel of oil to produce one barrel of oil. If this were true, then it would take more than one barrel of oil to extract one barrel of oil out of the ground and refine it. Realistically, the oil companies use the barrels of oil that they extract to produce and refine their oil. Let's use an example and say that it takes 2 barrels of oil to produce 1 barrel of oil. Where ... Read More:
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