The Green Collar Economy: How One Solution Can Fix Our Two Biggest Problems
The Green Collar Economic climate: How A single Remedy Can Fix Our Two Largest Difficulties
Provocative, individual, and inspirational, The Green Collar Economy is not a dire warning but rather a substantive and viable strategy for solving the most significant issues facing the country—the failing economic system and our devastated setting. From a distance, it appears that these two problems are separate, but when we appear closer, the connection becomes unmistakable. In The Green Collar Economy, acclaimed activist and political advisor Van Jones delivers a real solution that both rescues our economy and
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Reader beware,
As someone who is interested in energy and the environment, I took the book from the library in order to get an in depth view from the "green" side of propositions for rational (economy-wise) "green" policies.
I was sorely disappointed.
The book spends a lot of pages on irrelevant racial justice issues. If I wanted to read about the misbehavior of sheriffs of Gretna LA to hurricane Katrina survivors, I would have taken a book on hurricane Katrina.
On the other side, the book is very light on details. For example, "cutting emissions to California's per capita level would allow the U.S. to surpass Kyoto targets". What are the Kyoto targets, where is California with regard to that, how do you extrapolate from California to the rest of the country.
It mentions that we may run out of Uranium and coal. When? Based on what rates on consumption?
A lot of emphasis is given to weatherizing homes. However, the author does not talk how it can be done (e.g tax incentives).
There is no treatment of the cost of green energy and no mention of the true economical problems with going green (e.g efficient batteries and photovoltaic solar cells).
In addition to the missing details, there are glaring inaccuracies and biased information. For example, the author mentions that we can be completely get rid of both carbon based energy and nuclear energy by 2020. No mention is made with regard to the economical cost California is paying for its "green" policies, e.g driving heavy industries (and jobs) to other states; insufficient energy generation resulting in blackouts and brownouts; high energy cost (electrical and gas).
Bottom line: do not waste your time.
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|The Reality Check on nuclear power is itself detached from reality,
More nuclear power is produced here in American than in France and nuclear power provides 77 percent of France's electricity. But yet Van Jones dismisses nuclear power in one short paragraph (13 lines). Is he serious that things like more caulk guns will solve our growing energy needs? And if he really believes that there are viable energy solutions contained in this book why didn't he bother to create an index so that they can be found more easily by readers seriously looking for realistic answers to our complex energy challenges?
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|Leaves much to be desired,
The Green Collar Economy covers a very important issue, at a very important moment in history, so I wish Van Jones had done a better job.
My largest complaint is that so much of this book (the first 65 pages) covers nothing but Hurricane Katrina and race relations. You would never tell from the cover descriptions or introduction that this really is a book about race and class. Van Jones comes across as obsessed with this issue, yet fails to convince me of a real connection between race and the environment.
Van Jones is also very non-specific throughout most of the book. He desperately needs more evidence, comparisons, and statistics to back up his claims. Not until the second to last chapter do we learn of specific policy solutions.
The Green Collar Economy also neglects some of the most important green issues. He dedicates less than one page to suburban sprawl vs. transit oriented development, which is really a paramount topic. Rail as a means of intercity travel is barely mentioned. He hardly mentions Europe, even though the US has so much to learn from them (How can you write book on anything green without drawing comparisons to Europe?).
Bottom line is I'm not sure who this book is for. Environmentalists will be unsatisfied with the lack of new information, and conservatives will remain unconvinced that Van Jones' proposals will actually work.
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