Cape Wind: Money, Celebrity, Class, Politics, and the Battle for Our Energy Future on Nantucket Sound - Hardcover

Whitcomb, Robert; Williams, Wendy

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1586483978 ISBN 13: 9781586483975

Publisher: PublicAffairs, 2007

Synopsis

When Jim Gordon set out to build a wind farm off the coast of Cape Cod, he knew some people might object. But there was a lot of merit in creating a privately funded, clean energy source for energy-starved New England, and he felt sure most people would recognize it eventually. Instead, all Hell broke loose. Gordon had unwittingly challenged the privileges of some of America's richest and most politically connected people, and they would fight him tooth and nail, no matter what it cost, and even when it made no sense.

Cape Wind is a rollicking tale of democracy in action and plutocracy in the raw as played out among colorful and glamorous characters on one of our country's most historic and renowned pieces of coastline. As steeped in American history and local color as The Prince of Providence; as biting, revealing and fun as Philistines at the Hedgerow, it is also a cautionary tale about how money can hijack democracy while America lags behind the rest of the developed world in adopting clean energy.

About this title

About the Author

Wendy Williams has written for many major publications, including Scientific American, The Christian Science Monitor, The Boston Globe, The Providence Journal and The Baltimore Sun. She has been journalist-in-residence at Duke University and at the Hasting Center; a fellow at the Center for environmental Journalism at the University of Colorado and at the Marine Biological Laboratory. The author of several books, she lives on Cape Cod. Robert Whitcomb is a vice president and editorial page editor of The Providence Journal. Before that he served as the financial editor of The International Herald Tribune; and as editor and writer for The Wall Street Journal.

Review

"Cape Wind is a fun read, and a fun way to learn about renewable energy." -- The American, May 11, 2007

"Cape Wind is breezy and informative fun." -- Weekly Standard, May 14, 2007

"A genuine page-turner...The story as presented could not be more entertaining." -- Boston Globe, July 5

"Displaying their impressive combined investigative skills, Williams and Whitcomb unearth some real gems of quotes related to the wind-farm debate. Indeed, it is the authors' ability to cite so many names, dates, and events that give the book such solid ground... Cape Wind is an example of investigative journalism at its best." -- Popmatters.com, October 16, 2007

"It's a surprise when a book on environmental politics reads like a good whodunit or an exposé." -- Working Waterfront, May 2007

"The authors took a potentially dull subject and have turned it into an entertaining read... A crisply written, well-told story..." -- Hartford Courant, June 10, 2007

"The book is entertaining and reads at times like a novel, with suspense built in between the chapters." -- Vineyard Gazette, April 27, 2007

"[This story] seems to have everything... [A] delicious spectacle of self-described environmentalists...[It has] the ingredients for a first-rate politico-eco drama." -- New York Times, May 25, 2007

"[Williams and Whitcomb] gleefully lay out [the] story" and that the Cape Wind controversy is "a ripe subject." -- Journal, May 25, 2007

"a fascinating story in which a developer...is David, while Goliath is an alliance of fabulously wealthy summer people." -- Providence Journal, May 6, 2007

About this edition

• Publisher: PublicAffairs
• Publication date: 2007
• ISBN 10: 1586483978
• ISBN 13: 9781586483975
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 352