Advance Praise for Shorting the Grid
The modern world depends on a few essential networks: telephone, GPS, and, of course, the World Wide Web. And all of those networks rely on the mother network: the electric grid. In Shorting the Grid, Meredith Angwin provides an enormously valuable, clear, and succinct explanation of our most important network. She shows how it works, why its vulnerable, and why we should be concerned about what she lyrically calls the angelic miracle of the power grid. If you care about the future of our increasingly electrified world, buy this book and read it.
Robert Bryce, author of A Question of Power: Electricity and the Wealth of Nations
An eye-opening expos of our grids vulnerabilities. The deregulated grid is highly political, secretive, overly complex, and unable to meet public needs like reliability, affordability, and low pollution. If you take for granted that the lights go on when you flip a switch, this book may blow your mind.
Joshua S. Goldstein, author of A Bright Future: How Some Countries Have Solved Climate Change and the Rest Can Follow
Shorting the Grid is full of sharp writing and engaging stories about the most hidden part of our gridhow grid-level decisions are made. Readers will come away with an understanding of the Grid not just as a machine, but as a web of people and policies that shape the rules on how energy is made, paid for, moved, and used.
Dan Nott
Dan Nott is the artist and author of Hidden Systems, a forthcoming graphic non-fiction book about major types of infrastructure.
The North American electric grid is the largest machine in the world. Electricity is key to modern civilization, providing energy in its most useful form, powering industry, commerce, and living. Future blackouts will cost the U.S. economy $2 billion an hour. However, power-generating utilities dont run the grid anymore. Other empowered stakeholders pursue diverging objectives, which means that prices rise and grid reliability drops.
Why? Its complicated. Reading Angwins book is like chatting with an expert who helps you understand the underlying engineering, finances, and policies creating the risks. Her narrative moves back and forth between insightful overviews and specific examples. The book covers many grid attributes, suggesting realistic conclusions without ideological advocacy.
This book is a must-read for anyone suggesting any improvement in our electricity supply, for academics trying to conduct analyses, for businesses needing continuous economic energy, for legislative and regulatory staffers, and energy-concerned citizens.
Dr. Robert Hargraves, Author of Thorium, Energy Cheaper than Coal and co-founder of ThorCon Power
The electric power grid is the most important machine in the modern world. It is poised to become even more important as electricity is tapped to take over from fossil fuels in the fight against climate change. The grid will soon be all that it is today plus our gas station and home heating, not to mention a huge source of revenue for city governments. So it is remarkable that, at exactly this critical moment, grid management and planning have descended into a morass of secret cross purposes with nobody in charge and profiteers running rampant. How can we fix it? To fix the grid we have to know it, and the very best way to know it is to read Meredith Angwins timely and alarming new book Shorting the Grid.
Steve Aplin, blogger at Canadian Energy Issues
The National Academy of Engineering describes the U.S. power grid as the supreme engineering achievement of the 20th century. Its user interface has customer-facing simplicity that hides a system of massive complexity. The grids engineering excellence has allowed almost all Americans to simply assume its future existence.
But Meredith Angwin is an unusually perceptive maven who digs deeply when initial answers dont make sense. Shes learned that the marvelous machine that is the foundation of modern living is being threatened by political and financially motivated maneuvers.
Shorting the Grid reveals reasons why we must pay more attention to grid governance and the potential of poor decisions to override technical successes.
Rod Adams: Blogger at Atomic Insights, Managing Member at Nucleation Capital LP
Shorting the Grid reveals what may be the ultimate in Regulatory Capture: so-called deregulated electrical markets. In this book, author Meredith Angwin exposes the deregulated energy markets as a frightening example of the Golden Rule at play. Utilities, generators, and other moneyed interests have the Gold, so they get to make the Rules for the electrical grid that we all rely upon. One troubling consequence: nobody is responsible for ensuring theres enough electricity on the grid to meet demand.
With this eye-popping tour de force, author Meredith Angwin paints an infuriating portrait of fat-cat insiders making backroom deals to sweeten their profits even at the expense of the reliability of the grid they are supposedly entrusted with operating. Meanwhile, the public is left out of the loop and out in the cold.
Essential reading for anyone interested in clean energy policy and decarbonization.
David Schumacher, Director of The New Fire
Copyrighted Material
Shorting the Grid: The Hidden Fragility of Our Electric Grid
2020 by Meredith Angwin.
All Rights Reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any meanselectronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwisewithout prior written permission from the publisher, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review.
For information about this title or to order other books and/or electronic media, contact the publisher:
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PO Box 741
Wilder, VT 05088
http://www.meredithangwin.com
Carnot Communications publications are available at special discounts for bulk purchases in the U.S. by corporations, institutions, and other organizations. For more information, please contact the author at .
All pictures not otherwise credited are credited to Meredith Angwin.
Hardcover ISBN: 978-0-9891190-8-5
Paperback ISBN: 978-1-7353580-0-0
Ebook ISBN: 978-0-9891190-9-2
Cover and interior design: 1106 Design
Published in the United States of America. Application submitted for Library of Congress registration.
Legal Disclaimer: This book contains anecdotes and opinions of the author, Meredith Angwin, based on her own experience in understanding grid governance. Meredith Angwin is not a lawyer, and nothing in this book is to be considered legal advice. For legal advice on any subject in this book, please seek a licensed professional in your locality (lawyer or barrister).
Accuracy Disclaimer: Information contained in this book is believed to be accurate. However, neither Meredith Angwin nor Carnot Communications guarantees the accuracy or completeness of any information published herein. Neither Meredith Angwin nor Carnot Communications will be responsible for any errors, omissions, or claims for damages, arising out of use, inability to use, or with regard to the accuracy or sufficiency of the information contained in this book.
Dedicated to George, my partner in life, and to our children and their families
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