Let it shine : the 6,000-year story of solar energy

Summary: "Unprecedented gas prices, heat waves and droughts, climate change, Solyndra - all make "alternative" sources of energy contemporary areas of activism, controversy, lobbying, and legislation. Yet few know that the ancient Chinese, Greeks, and Romans used solar energy in their architecture; that Galileo and da Vinci both planned uses for the power of the sun; and that by 1918, there were more than 4,000 solar water heaters in California. The history of solar architecture and energy technologies gives readers an epiphany-producing sense of its future. Detailing a realistic alternative to fossil fuels, in illustrations the New York Times called "especially fine," and prose Library Journal termed "highly readable," Let It Shine shows that there is nothing - and plenty - new under the sun"--

Record details

ISBN: 9781608681327 (hardback)
ISBN: 1608681327 (hardback)
ISBN: 9781608681334 (ebook)
Physical Description: print
xxi, 519 pages : illustrations ; 23 cm
Edition: Fully revised and expanded
Publisher: Novato, California : New World Library, [2013]

Content descriptions

General Note:	Revision of: A golden thread / by Ken Butti and John Perlin. -- Palo Alto : Cheshire Books ; New York : Van Nostrand Reinhold, �1980.
Bibliography, etc. Note:	Includes bibliographical references (pages 455-495) and index.
Formatted Contents Note:	Early Use of the Sun -- Power of the Sun -- Solar Water Heating -- Solar House Heating -- Photovoltaics -- The Post -Oil Embargo Era.