Publisher's Weekly Review
Journalist Bryce, author of Gusher of Lies and managing editor of online industry newsmagazine Energy Tribune, is nothing if not polemical. While his swings are sometimes familiar ("The essence of protecting the environment can be distilled to a single phrase: Small is beautiful") and sometimes bizarre ("The world isn't using too much oil. It's not using enough"), the points he raises merit serious consideration. In this informed, opinionated state-of-the-industry overview, Bryce contends that energy policy must be based upon four imperatives: "power density, energy density, cost and scale." Wind and solar power, he says, fail those standards due to storage problems and the vagaries of weather; Denmark, the poster child for renewable energy, nevertheless imports hydroelectric power from Norway and Sweden, relies heavily upon North Sea oil and coal, and increased its greenhouse gas emissions by 2.1 percent between 1990 and 2006. Pointing to the environmental cost of hydropower ("ruining habitats for aquatic life"), oil spills, and coal mining, Bryce makes a strong case for heavier reliance upon natural gas, a relatively clean and readily available carbon fuel, as a bridge technology: "The smartest, most forward-looking U.S. energy policy can be summed up in one acronym: `N2N'," for "natural gas to nuclear power." (May) Copyright 2010 Reed Business Information.
Kirkus Review
"Oil is greener than nearly everything else that might replace it," writes Texas-based energy journalist and Energy Tribune managing editor Bryce in this contrarian, discontented approach to renewable energy Energy sources must be judged, the author writes, by the four imperatives: power density, energy density, cost and scale. By that measure, oil is a good source of energy, while corn ethanol is not, since corn-ethanol production requires huge swaths of agricultural land put in the service of making something that is inferior to gasoline, containing "just two-thirds of gasoline's heat content." So far, so goodand indeed, the ethanol craze has already passed. But Bryce has it in for other much ballyhooed forms of energy production as well. Wind doesn't cut it because it takes lots of land to build towers that in turn don't produce much electricity, whereas a coal-burning plant performs wonders. The author harbors special hopes for nuclear energy, observing that many of its former foesStewart Brand notably among themhave since recanted. He is right to note that even if the United States succeeds in reducing carbon emissions to Kyoto Protocol levels, the rest of the world, and particularly the energy-poor world, will not "ignore the relatively low-cost power than can be derived from hydrocarbons." Though his arguments will provide comfort to the drill-baby-drill set, Bryce's recommendations are not without qualifications. He opposes mountaintop removal for coal, for instance, and has hope for an expanded role for solar power. Though he defends some of the old sources of energy production by assuming that technological improvements will remediate environmental damage, the author seems reluctant to allow that renewable forms of energy are not staticwind generation technology is steadily improving, for instance, while biofuels are becoming ever easier and more cost-effective to produce. A little less sneering and fewer straw men would have improved this statistics-rich and generally capably argued case. Al Gore won't be blurbing this one, but advocates of renewable energy should familiarize themselves with the book, since oil, gas and coal lobbyists surely will. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Choice Review
Power Hungry is the newest book of author/journalist Bryce, a strong proponent of the continued use of fossil fuel. Bryce begins the three-part work by discussing the world's huge, accelerating demand for energy. In part 2, he tries to dismiss all arguments in favor of renewable energies, ranging from solar to wind to biomass. In part 3, the author suggests that the solution for the power-hungry world is within what he calls "N2N," i.e., from "natural gas to nuclear power." The final short chapter, "Moving Forward," further emphasizes the author's views. The book claims to be fact based and scientifically well founded. However, most cited references are from popular magazine articles, nontechnical reports, and public speeches. Thus, many arguments are scientifically unsound. The book reads easily, as Bryce writes in journalistic style. Power Hungry is useful for general readers who are pursuing energy debates since it considers energy from availability, price, and scale points of view, and realistically warns that many renewable options are not yet competitive compared to fossil/nuclear counterparts. The book will also help those who are fighting for renewable energy, particularly on the management/political side, as their opponents are most likely already equipped with all the arguments presented here. Summing Up: Recommended. General readers. M. Alam Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Library Journal Review
Most Americans view green jobs and green energy as our path to a clean energy future. Not so fast, proclaims energy journalist Bryce (Gusher of Lies); he challenges the scalability of renewable energy required for the world's enormous energy demand and explains why hydrocarbons (oil, coal) will be needed for a long time. With a strong stab at T. Boone Pickens's wind plan, he discredits wind power as a solution to environmental problems because all wind turbines must be backed up with gas-fired generators. Bryce considers unrealistic such ideas as carbon capture and sequestration, cellulosic ethanol, and electric cars. The solution for transitioning to a cleaner, lower-carbon future is N2N-natural gas to nuclear-because it has a higher power density and can provide the quantities of energy we need. VERDICT Bryce, whose home has solar panels, uses copious facts and research to make a compelling case that renewable sources have their place in our energy future but they aren't the viable panacea we're led to believe. Recommended for readers interested in both sides of the energy debate.-Eva Lautemann, Georgia Perimeter Coll. Lib., Clarkston (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
