"Wind is renewable, Turbines are not" -- Ozzie Zehner

Ozzie Zehner  is the author of Green Illusions: The Dirty Secrets of Clean Energy and the Future of Environmentalism  which was published last month.

 

We don’t have an energy crisis. We have a consumption crisis. And this book, which takes aim at cherished assumptions regarding energy, offers refreshingly straight talk about what’s wrong with the way we think and talk about the problem. Though we generally believe we can solve environmental problems with more energy—more solar cells, wind turbines, and biofuels—alternative technologies come with their own side effects and limitations. How, for instance, do solar cells cause harm? Why can’t engineers solve wind power’s biggest obstacle? Why won’t contraception solve the problem of overpopulation, lying at the heart of our concerns about energy, and what will?

 

Ozzie Zehner is a visiting scholar at the University of California, Berkeley. His recent publications include public science pieces in Christian Science Monitor, The American Scholar, The Humanist, The Futurist, Women’s Studies Quarterly  and The Economist as well as educational resources in Green Technology (Sage, 2011) and Green Culture (Sage, 2011). Zehner’s research and projects over the previous two decades have been covered by CNN, MSNBC, USA Today, Science News Radio, The Washington Post, Business Week and numerous other media outlets. He also serves on the editorial board of Critical Environmentalism.

 

Zehner primarily researches the social, political and economic conditions influencing energy policy priorities and project outcomes. His work also incorporates symbolic roles that energy technologies play within political and environmental movements.