Rating: 
Summary: Serious topic, worthy of a more serious treatment
Review: David Goodstein, author of "Out of Gas: The End of the Age of Oil", needs no lessons in alarmism. His entire book can be summed up by its first paragraph, whose last sentence reads as follows: "Even if human life does go on, civilization as we know it will not survive, unless we can find a way to live without fossil fuels." The rest of this short book is meant to be proof of this thesis.In the Introduction and the initial chapter, Goodstein is effective in convincing us that the impending crisis -- one precipitated by dwindling supplies of oil -- will be upon us much sooner than we think. He takes up what others have proposed or theorized as ways out of the crisis (methane, shale, nuclear fusion, etc.) and makes his case for why those are unlikely to suffice. After that the book fills in some very basic facts about the relevant physics associated with energy production and concludes with a revisit of the main ideas. It's not clear what level of audience this book is aimed at. My best guess is that the author had in mind a group of college freshman with non-science majors. There's a strong air of condescension about the book, reinforced (perhaps I imagined this) by the standard author's photograph in which Goodstein strikes a stern, professorial expression. The diagrams meant to illustrate textual points are laughably simplistic. This book is another example of what I sense is a disturbing trend in publishing. It's a small format book with generous line spacing and margins. The Notes are minimal. Yet it's been priced and reviewed as if it were a more substantial treatise, with little mention of its brevity. Goodstein obviously knows what he's talking about. In "Out of Gas", he manages to convince us that this is an important subject deserving a more comprehensive and energetic effort.
Rating: 
Summary: Thermodynamics for Dummies
Review: Goodstein's book stands out from others about Peak Oil I've read because he emphasizes the thermodynamic aspects of the oil problem. Economic reasoning about energy resources can be misleading because economics arose in the 18th Century and implicitly assumed the Newtonian scientific worldview before it incorporated the concepts of heat and entropy developed in the 19th Century. In other words, economics presupposes the existence of perpetual-motion machines. In the physical reality we have to live in, however, the "energy returned on energy invested" (EROEI) determines the true value of an energy resource. The good old-fashioned gushing oil wells we had 50-60 years ago had EROEI's of 100:1 or better, whereas current oil extraction has an EROEI around 10:1 on average and falling. When the EROEI of an energy resource falls down to 2:1 or less, the game is over because you aren't yielding enough energy to maintain an industrial civilization, much less to grow it. However we keep seeing physically ignorant economic analyses of alternative energy "sources" like ethanol-from-corn, Canadian oil sands, hydrogen fuel cells etc. that are really pseudoscientific because they have unity or worse EROEI's, even if the author can assign some arbitrary "price" to the final product that makes them seem "competitive" with real energy supplies.
Once you understand and integrate the thermodynamic aspect of the energy problem, you realize that the seemingly colossal reserve of oil sands in Alberta is useless and irrelevant if you can't extract it with a high enough EROEI. Moreover, any physically plausible way to capture a form of energy to replace oil will require a massive investment from the current and struggling stream of fossil fuels supplies for its construction, and it will have to generate an EROEI thereafter that is not only sufficient for our current needs, but also leaves plenty for building its replacements and further expanding the supply without having to dip into additional fossil fuels. Solar panels and windmills can't do this; the factories which make them don't run off of sunlight and wind, but are plugged into the regular electrical grid powered by coal, natural gas and nuclear. Until we can find the thermodynamic trap door that frees us from fossil fuels, we face the prospect of the "Dieoff" plausibly argued on certain Websites, especially considering that modern agriculture burns about ten calories of fossil fuels energy to deliver one calorie of food energy to our tables. Goodstein deserves a lot of credit for trying to get out the truth about the energy emergency, despite the cognitive resistance he's encountering from people who claim to be knowledgeable about physics yet who have been hypnotized by "economics."
Rating: 
Summary: Disjointed
Review: Half the book concerns running out of gas and half is a freshman physics class. I don't know why he combined two different books into one. Both sections are reasonbly good.
Minor quibbles: At one point he talks about the gap between supply and demand reaching 50%. It can be argued that such a gap can't exist, because you can't consume more than what's available. If supply drops and demand increases, prices go up.
He also said that if an object was between the Earth and the Sun and was moving so as to keep pace with the Earth, it would spiral into the sun. That would only be true if it had an engine that constantly slowed it down to keep pace with the Earth. Without an engine, it would be in an elliptical orbit. He didn't mention anything about an engine in his description of the situation.
Rating: 
Summary: Burn this book for fuel
Review: I chose to read this book because I'm already familiar with the issues of fossil fuel depeletion and deeply concerned about our transition into the looming Post-Petroleum Age. After skimming the first few pages, I was under the impression the author would reveal some hopeful alternatives as a map to steer us through the looming crisis. Not so. After wading through several chapters of tedious and irrelevant explanations of basic science and engineering, lured on with each turn of the page by the promise of light at the end of the tunnel, I learned that the light was indeed a train. The conclusion of the book is totally, abjectly pessimistic.
This book plunged me into a morass of despair for over a week. Fortunately I'm a resilient person and managed to bounce back to resume enjoyment of life as I currently experience it, limited though the duration of this current era may be.
Since reading the book, I've seen news reports of alternate energy breakthroughs in China, and heard other indications that when the chips are down, our scientists will come through.
My recommendation: Do yourself a favor and burn this book. The resulting blaze will warm you for several minutes!
Rating:
Summary: Interesting, but at times difficult to read and depressing
Review: I consider myself an educated lay reader, but I found large sections of this short book to be difficult to get through. As other reviewers mentioned, I might have been more willing to focus on the science if I had understood WHY the technical facts were important to the author's arguments. I felt that after reading the introduction and first chapter, I understood Goodstein's argument as well as his reliance on Hubbert's thesis. But beyond that, I didn't really gain much other than learning that all alternatives to oil are either nearly depleted, not practical, or could (literally!) spell the end of life on this planet.
Reading the book did cause me to stop and think about our reliance on oil, so in this regard, Goodstein achieves one of his goals. Unfortunately, however, I feel worried and guilty without any sense of motivation to do anything. I was left with the depressing outlook of a doomed planet where any personal conservation efforts are futile. In short, I don't recommend this book to the lay reader. There has got to be a better book out there.
Rating:
Summary: Urgent subject, simplistic book
Review: I ordered "The End of Oil" at the same time as "Out of Gas". I started with this book because it was smaller. In fact, once you strip out the significant digression of thast few chapters, it barely rates more than a pamphlet.
Even though I agree with the premise and the conclusions of this book, the subject treatment is simplistic. Whatever you do, don't launch into a discussion on the subject with only this book as input.
The one insight I found very worthwhile is that the talk of a Hydrogen Economy is fundamentally flawed. Hydrogen is NOT a fuel source, but an energy storage tool, something like a battery. The actual energy still has to come from traditional or alternative sources, probably natural gas. All the hydrogen will do is to let us cart around some of that energy in our cars or pipe it to market. We've GOT to do better than that if the worst-case scenarios are to be avoided.
Save yourself the trouble, buy the <a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0618239774/qid=1099753508/sr=8-1/ref=pd_csp_1/102-0289418-5788944?v=glance&s=books&n=507846">The End of Oil</a>. Then DO SOMETHING! Talk with your friends, co-workers. We MUST raise the flag on this most critical issue. The market, in spite of the deluded hopes of the neo-conservatives, will not bring in the changes in time to save us. Waiting for the market to change the energy economy is dooming us to more oil wars, catastrophic disruptions in society and terrible pollution.
DO SOMETHING!
Rating:
Summary: Waste of Time and....Energy
Review: The author argues that ethanol, in addition to some other energy sources, need more energy to produce than the energy produced from them. This book is exactly like ethanol. More energy wasted to produce it than the benefits from it. In fact, the ratio is ethanol is much better!
It is not worth reading. It looks like some one expressing himself about certain issues: no evidence, no substance, no solutions. Even newspaper editorials are more serious than this monograph.
Rating:
Summary: waste of energy
Review: The conclusions may correct but this book is unconvincing, The only positive is it doesn't waste much time to read because there isn't much content. The author is another Mr smarty panty who doesn't have time to gather data to support his conclusions. A 30 second search on the net yields more information. Who cares about entropy? Really?
Rating:
Summary: ok book
Review: This book does a good job of explaining the inevitable oil crisis. It even does a good job of explaining what a joule, carolie, and other scientific terms. What I am having trouble understanding is what we are supposed to do. The author suggests nuclear and solar alternatives, acknowledging its drawbacks. He even discusses more efficient uses of energy. I still don't believe this is going to solve it. "the rest of the world wants in" he says, to the United States lifestyle and living standard. Because of that, I don't see how we're going to solve the energy problem. Simply put, there aren't enough energy resources available for everyone to live like the United States. Therefore, it is time for us to create a strategic oil reserve much greater than the one we have now. We need to be buying up the rest of the oil supply and reserve it for the United States. If there are truly only 2.7 trillion barrels left (he argues there are only 2 trillion but the USGS says there may be 2.7) we should develop 5 strategic oil reserves of about 200 million. That should give us enough to last out everyone else. If it is inevitable that we are going to lose our living standard and that it is unsustainable, let's make the best of it.
Rating: 
Summary: Demystifies and Explains the Consequence of Oil
Review: This book should be required reading for all students in high school and college social studies courses. Anyone who is not yet well informed about how fossil fuels help define our economic and social culture should read it as well.
I began reading this book knowing next to nothing about energy and oil. In fact, I began reading the book feeling that its subject was "somehow important", and had little expectation of actually reading every word (which I did).
To my surprise, I discovered that Professor Goodstein, beyond being a foremost expert on his subject, is a master of the English language who is able to explain history, chemistry, and physics in a rarely encountered way which is both lucid and concise.
I especially liked how he introduced short, telling biographies of scientists and inventors into his narrative.
Forgotten science lessons came back to me in sharp relief. What is energy? What is "global warming"? What makes engines work? These are among many of the questions that are succintly and clearly answered.
The relevance of energy to history and current events also became more focused for me.
I imagined how ages passed that life sustained itself principally on the sun in a delicate ecological balance, and then how (with knowledge and resourcefulness) humans multiplied and prospered by exploiting their enviornment. Today, when persons protest against the War in Iraq by shouting, "No Blood For Oil!"-- are their insinuations that the United States is fighting an "energy war" to be believed?
The author does not look at or address this specific topic. However, I thought about it the whole while I was reading, and armed with the facts he presented I, upon finishing the book, came to my own definite conclusion.
Without revealing it here, I can unequivocably assert that the author (who reveals no partisanship) convinced me beyond doubt that the Energy Crisis itself is real and dire, and that it has immediate consequences for everyone. He also convinced me that wise and deliberate stewardship of our natural resources is imperative if civilization is to continue.
Out of Gas: The End of the Age of Oil could be made into an excellent educational documentary film for public television, in a format similar to those presented by Boston's WGBH in its Nova series.
This book's message is really too universally important to be left for just we readers.
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