| BIG COAL The Dirty Secret Behind America's Energy Future Jeff Goodell Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2006 |
Rating: 5.0 High |
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| ISBN-13 978-0-618-31940-4 | ||||
| ISBN-10 0-618-31940-9 | 324p. | HC/BWI | $25.95 | |
| Page 9: | "...the creatures that normally help break down the complex carbon compound in tree bark — herbivores, termites, and certain bacteria — hadn't evolved yet." |
| S/B "complex carbon compounds". |
| Page 11: | "From drilling samples, geologists estimate Big George to be two hundred feet thick — one of the single richest coal seams in the world." |
| Word order: S/B "richest single coal seams". |
| Page 11: | "Unlike petroleum or natural gas, which pools in reservoirs deep underground and migrates through fissures and fractures, coal rises and falls with the folds of the earth in predictable patterns." |
| Number errors: S/B "pool" and "migrate". Also, crude oil and natural gas are often found in domelike structures within the folds of the earth, where the layers of rock are impermeable to them. |
| Pages 48-49: | "Invitees [...] perused exhibitions of the company's new technologies — a life-size model of a hybrid-engine train..." |
| Inasmuch as this took place at "a glitzy cocktail party on Pennsylvania Avenue," I very much doubt the train was life-sized. |
| Page 65: | "It can move seven thousand yards of dirt in a ten-hour shift." |
| Missing word: S/B "seven thousand cubic yards". |
| Page 83: | "Big Coal executives love to tout coal plants as being invulnerable to terrorist attacks (at least not in the way that nuclear or even gas plants are), but..." |
| Missing word: S/B "(at least not vulnerable in the way that nuclear or even gas plants are)". |
| Page 87: | "In 2001, [...] BNSF secretly ran genetic tests on a number of employees to see if they had a gene for carpal tunnel syndrome." |
| I checked on this because I was unaware of such a gene. In fact, there is — or may be. The picture is complex; research continues. See WHEN SCIENCE FICTION BECAME FACT. So the company erred twice: by jumping out ahead of medical knowledge in 2001 (actually 2000), and by testing the employees without their informed consent. |
| Page 93: | "The helpers disconnected a few miles later at Hemingford, pulling off on a sidetrack, and we were on our own again." |
| Missing space: S/B "a side track". |
| Page 102: | "Edison had not only designed and built the first dynamo and the first incandescent bulb, but he also had created the first electric power system — the wires, transformers, and plugs — and used his own money and political clout to get it built in downtown Manhattan." |
| I think Edison's system was DC: no transformers. Check this. (And check spelling of "aquifer" on page 41.) |
| Page 133: | "As it turns out, the creation of ultrafines increases when larger particles are removed from the mix, primarily because the large particles are like tiny balls of Velcro, causing the ultrafines to adhere to them and drawing them out of the air." |
| (Emphasis in original) This is counterintuitive. If the larger particles are removed, why don't they take the ultrafines with them? I don't doubt the description, I just think it's incomplete. |
| Page 134: | "Mercury is an element, one of the ninety-four naturally occurring chemicals that are the building blocks of our world." |
| Inaccurate: S/B "ninety-two". |
| Page 134: | "One of the unusual characteristics of mercury is its ability to accumulate in the tissues of living creatures." |
| This is not unusual at all. |
| Page 151: | "In the pro-sprawl, pro-gonzo development South, there has been decidedly less outcry." |
| Missing hyphen: S/B "pro-gonzo-development". |
| Page 157: | "Ten of the power plants cited in the lawsuit were owned by the Southern Company — five in Alabama, one in Mississippi, and three in Georgia..." |
| Math error: S/B "Nine". (5 + 1 + 3 != 10) |
| Page 173: | "Still, the subject of global warming remains beyond our grasp." |
| Poorly phrased. I think something like "is not fully understood" would get closer to the current situation. (The explanation on page 174 clarifies this.) |
| Page 176: | "In the atmosphere, CO2 functions like the glass panes of a greenhouse: it lets short-wave solar radiation in but doesn't let much long-wave radiation (heat) out." |
| This is inaccurate. (It tripped me up long ago, when I tried to explain it on CompuServe.) The glass panes of an actual greenhouse work because they block convection — the rising air currents that would otherwise carry the heat away. The atmospheric CO2 blocks radiation — a different process, but with the same result. |
| Page 177: | "There are more than twenty different greenhouse gases, including methane which is less common than CO2 but more potent. Other greenhouse gases are less of an immediate issue than CO2 because industrial society is not dumping hundreds of millions of tons of them into the atmosphere each year. But as the earth warms, it creates a positive feedback cycle that could change that." |
| The highlighted sentence should be deleted; it distorts the meaning of the paragraph. |
| Page 223: | "...is piped 205 miles over the northern plains and under Lake Sakakawea until it reaches this old oil field..." |
| This is one of the variant spellings allowed; others are Sacagawea and Sacajawea. They all refer to the Native American woman who accompanied Lewis and Clark. |
| Page 225: | "...the risk of large, catastrophic releases of CO2, such as Lake Nyos and Mammoth Mountain, are virtually nonexistent..." |
| Number error: S/B "is". |
| Page 252: | "...but it was built with human ingenuity — and can be modified and disassembled with human ingenuity." |
| I would have said "modified or disassembled". |
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