Lights Out!: Ten Myths About (and Real Solutions to) America's Energy Crisis

by Spencer Abraham, William Tucker

In this timely book, former Secretary of Energy Spencer Abraham debunks the myths that warp our current debate over energy, and offers new solutions to the real problems we face in America.

Drawing on the very latest thinking from experts in industry and academia, and his own experiences running America's Energy Department, he proposes a fresh approach to meeting our daunting energy threats. This book effectively answers how America and the world can overcome the challenges of rising global energy demand, geopolitical disruptions of the energy marketplace, and the environmental impact of producing and using energy. What emerges is a pragmatic energy strategy that calls for blending a variety of energy sources including nuclear, clean coal, solar, wind, and natural gas with a more determined effort at improving energy efficiency through the deployment of smart energy grids and buildings, to help meet our challenges while preserving our economy and environment.

Coming in the midst of a national debate about global warming, energy dependence and rising energy prices and rich with anecdotes from the author's service in the Senate and cabinet, this book is a clarion call that will help shape our energy future.

Genres: Nonfiction

272 pages, Hardcover

First published June 29, 2010

About the author

Spencer Abraham was America's 10th and longest serving Secretary of Energy. He was previously a U.S. Senator (R-Mich). He is now the Chairman and CEO of The Abraham Group, an international business/strategic consulting firm based in Washington, D.C. His clients include a number of businesses in the energy sector and he serves on the Boards of several energy and non energy firms.

Reviews

[Spencer Carey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lights Out is a book about the energy future of the United States, talking about ten myths and ten real solutions to our problems. I chose to read this book because I like to know our problems going forward in the United States, and want to try and solve them by being a well-informed voter at the polls. The author is Spencer Abraham a former United States Senator from Michigan and Secretary of Energy during George W. Bush presidency from 2001-2005. The information in this book may have had accurate information in 2010, but since its 2017 the energy projections we may have already hit, or soon will hit so take that into account with the information. If you’re into a whole lot of data and graphs for our energy future then this book will not cut it for you. It talks mainly about the energy plan that should be put into place and explains why we have not finished those policies, such as expanding the grid, building more nuclear energy plants and many other things relating to the energy future of the United States.

There are some parts of the book that I did like and others I did not for instance. When Abraham talks about the energy crisis in California in 2001, when he came into office. He blamed the crisis solely on California for not building new power plants, and not Enron, the energy company that was causing the problems for California. And another problem in the book Abraham says environmentalists are over stating climate change. At least he believes in climate change, but there are no overstating large droughts, mass migration, acidification of the oceans, raising sea levels, extinction of animals and many other worse scenarios.

I did enjoy how the book changed my views on nuclear energy. Before I thought that we should just use renewable energy for all our energy problems. After reading this book I am all for nuclear energy and believe that it is safer than coal and natural gas, implemented with renewable energy will help solve our energy problems.

If your interesting in learning the problems of our complex energy problems in the future here in the United States, then this is the book for you.

[Josh Mengers · Rating 1 out of 5]

A decent book by the former secretary of energy. It is quite poorly written; the chapters are segmented, appearing to be each written independently and then thrown together. As such there is a lot of unnecessary repetition. Abraham also bogs down the read with unnecessary simple arithmetic, repetitively including conversions for SI prefixes such as KW to MW and MW to GW. His scientific understanding of energy topics is decent, but not without flaws. This book's redeeming quality is as a policy book; Abraham uses his experiences at the department of energy to implore insightful policy change to solve this nation's and the world's energy crisis.

[Troy · Rating 2 out of 5]

Spencer Abraham was Secretary of Energy under George W. Bush. Before that he was a Senator who wanted to dismantle the Department of Energy. Spencer Abraham is a politician, not a technologist or scientist. He learned a lot about energy while Secretary, which he openly admits, and decided to write this book as a reflection on that knew knowledge, on the challenges we face in our energy economy, and of what is politically feasible today in America.

[Derek Walker · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very very interesting big-picture perspective on US energy. I thought the chapter on nuclear was fantastic-definitely the highlight of the book. I wasn't very impressed with the chapter on renewables, but still learned a lot.

Interesting reading reinventing fire by amory lovins before this.

[Ann · Rating 2 out of 5]

Nothing particularly special about this book, but it does bring up issues that many are ignorant of or would rather choose to ignore. The chapters are clearly separated from one another, so I was able to skip around based on what spiked my interest and ignore certain chapters altogether.