|
|
| Cover shown is revised edition. |
| OUR CHOICE A Plan To Solve the Climate Crisis Al Gore Emmaus, PA: Rodale, November 2009 |
Rating: 5.0 High |
|||
| ISBN-13 978-1-59486-734-7 | ||||
| ISBN-10 1-59486-734-8 | 415pp. | SC/LF/FCI | $26.99 | |
| Page 12: | "An old African proverb says, 'If you want to go quickly, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.' We have to go far...quickly." |
| So by the logic of this proverb, we have to go alone, together. Or am I being too literal? |
| Page 15: | "...those of us alive today have a rare privilege that few generations in history have known: the chance to undertake an historic mission worthy of our best efforts." |
| Well, Grammar Girl and The Slot say it's wrong; Englishforums.com, Scribe Consulting, and wsu.edu say it isn't (but prefer "a historic".) I proffer |
| Page 15: | "And therein, as Shakespeare named it, lies 'the rub'..." |
| Wording: S/B "And, as Shakespeare said, 'there's the rub.'". |
| Page 15: | "It is a mistake to believe that we can maintain the traditional silos of knowledge in all the different disciplines that hold essential components of the solution." |
| No dictionary defines "silo" such that it can be used this way. Yet the phrase is common throughout the business community, and even appears in law and psychiatry journals. I'm tempted to extend the bucolic imagery, but I guess I'll just farm it out. |
| Page 21: | "...in combination with fossil-fuel-dependent electric utilities and ideologically driven climate deniers..." |
| Missing word: S/B "climate-change deniers". |
| Page 24: | "The governor of Hawaii, where Obama was born, [...] personally examined and publicly verified the official certificate of his birth 48 years ago." |
| Wording: S/B combined into "where Obama was born 48 years ago". |
| Page 155: | In the picture caption: "...the accident at Chernobyl, which released more than 100 times as much radiation as the atomic bombs dropped on Nagasaki and Hiroshima." |
| Nothing really wrong, but these names are usually given in the opposite order; that is, in chronological order. Gore's ordering is like saying "The first presidents of the U.S. were Adams and Washington." |
| Page 159: | Numbers on the full-page figure. |
| Do these numbers tally the number of reactors, or just the number of power plants? |
| Page 160: | On the full-page figure: the label "SPENT-FUEL CONTAINER." |
| The label is attached to the wrong part. |
| Page 165: | The figure at bottom. |
| A better explanation of the wide range of CO2 footprints for nuclear ("1-288") is needed. |
| Page 167: | "Uranium-238, the most common form of uranium in nature, contains three additional neutrons in each atom compared to uranium-235, the rarer form that is used in the fuel of most reactors." |
| This sentence looks like it belongs somewhere else — or maybe should be deleted. |
| Page 173: | The picture of charcoal production. |
| Nothing emotionally slanted about that picture; charcoal production is hell! |
| Page 190: | "They reduce temperature extremes, provide a source of income when properly managed, reduce soil erosion..." |
| Missing word: S/B "a sustainable source of income" or similar. |
| Page 191: | Caption to the figure: "When the deciduous trees in the Northern Hemisphere (much larger than those in the Southern Hemisphere) lose their leaves..." |
| Is it the trees, or their population, that is "much larger"? |
| Page 198: | "...the degradation of soil quality continues to worsen and has reached levels that threaten food security for hundreds of millions of people." |
| Wording: S/B either "the degradation of soil quality continues" or "the soil quality continues to worsen. |
| Page 203: | "The combination of herbicides and the mechanical planting drill now make plowing largely unnecessary." |
| Number: S/B "makes". |
| Page 203: | "Moreover, the planting drill requires larger tractors [...] than is commonly found in less-developed countries." |
| Number: S/B "are". |
| Page 208: | "Dr. Jerry L. Hatfield, director of the National Soil Tilth Laboratory..." |
| I knew not this word. It can mean either cultivated land or, more technically, the state of aggregation of soil, especially as regards its suitability for growing crops. |
| Page 210: | "One of the unwanted weeds that thrive in higher CO2 environments, by the way, is poison ivy—which not only grows larger with more CO2 but also produces a much stronger form of urushiol, a poison that 80 percent of people are vulnerable to." |
| It thrives on CO2 Makes stronger poison too. It grows just like a weed To tell us that we don't need global warming, woh-oh-oh-oh-oh — global warming... While we're waking or sleeping that old gas keeps on creeping up the scale-ale-ale-ay-ale. |
| Page 216: | "Biochar is a form of fine-grained, porous charcoal that is highly resilient to decomposition in most soil environments." |
| Wording: S/B "highly resistant". |
| Page 220: | "...(breaking apart the two atoms in organic nitrogen and attaching them to hydrogen in order to feed nitrogen to the plants)..." |
| Wording: S/B "atmospheric nitrogen". |
| Page 236: | "Data from countries throughout the world appear to show that when women have access to a full range of reproductive health services, there are many fewer unwanted pregnancies that lead to abortion." |
| Wording: S/B "show". This is not a thing to soft-pedal, to be mealy-mouthed about. Or, as Yoda might put it: "No—appear to show not. Show, or show not." |
| Page 244: | "Overall U.S. electrical generation converts only 33 percent of fuel to electricity, but combined heat and power (CHP) plants extract more than twice as much useful energy by using energy twice." |
| Gore uses this phrase several more times. It may have a catchy palindromic sound but I don't like it; it's thermodynamically inaccurate. Also there's a comma missing: S/B "Overall, U.S.". |
| Page 249: | "In the global economy as a whole, using fuel twice by simultaneously generating electricity and thermal energy..." |
| There's that phrase again. |
| Page 261: | "In an era of cheap fossil fuel and little appreciation for the problems of air pollution and global warming, we stopped using energy twice." |
| And again. |
| Page 262: | "The United States is at the top of the building inefficiency range..." |
| U-S-A! U-S-A! (I'd reverse the wording: "is at the bottom of the building efficiency range.") |
| Page 275: | The four elements that make up the "super grid". |
| This description seems to me vague and "motherhoody". |
| Page 275: | "The entire grid will be digital..." |
| This means digital controls, right? |
| Page 277: | "The Galvin Electricity Initiative [...] concluded, 'At least a trillion dollars in gross domestic product is already being lost each year as a result' [of not having a smart grid in place]." |
| Wow! That sounds like what the Republicans say mitigation of global warming will do to the economy! |
| Page 279: | "...the average age of a substation transformer is 42 years—older than its projected useful life." |
| The quality goes in before the age goes on. |
| Page 280: | Caption to the figure: "...new batteries, such as NAS cells..." |
| I think this means sodium-sulfur: NaS cells. (The "a" should be lower-case.) |
| Page 285: | "However, the growing need for electricity storage has driven the investment of large amounts into the research..." |
| Wording: S/B "of large amounts of money". |
| Page 314: | "It can also trigger what psychologists call 'single-action bias'." |
| This is a vital point. See "Beware the Overuse of Emotional Appeals". |
| Page 314: | "An even more extreme proposal involves placing a giant parasol in orbit around the sun (sic) where it will partly shade the earth (sic) and reduce the amount of incoming sunlight." |
| Extreme it may be, but it should still be examined. (Also, capitalization missing: S/B "Sun" and "Earth".) |
| Page 383: | "...thus cutting down on wasteful idling at traffic lights while drivers wait for an opportunity to cut in front of the traffic flowing in the other direction." |
| Does Al Gore hate "right turn on red"? |
| Page 397: | "One by one, others joined in what became a powerful consensus that we had to act, boldly and quickly." |
| Unneeded comma: S/B "act boldly and quickly". |
To contact Chris Winter, send email to this address.