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inquiry_from_an_anti_library's review against another edition
adventurous
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
tense
fast-paced
3.0
Overview:
Climate change has become a business. From technology companies, to financial firms trying to profit from the changing environmental conditions. Society is preparing for the very climate change that society is creating. Adapting to the climate change, rather than mitigating climate change. Climate change is changing the political structure of the world. Challenging the sovereignty of states. For some nations, climate change is providing access to more resources. For others nations, their lands are threatened. Climate change is exacerbating the maldistribution of resources. There are winners and losers of climate change.
Innovations are developed to take on the effects of climate change, but technology tends to have negative consequences for the environment it is trying to ameliorate. The wealthier nations tend to not only be the biggest producers of greenhouse emissions, but also have the most resources to respond to the detrimental effects of climate change. Those with the resources can protect themselves against the detrimental effects.
Caveats?
As the author acknowledges, this is not a book about the science of climate change. This is a book about the responses to climate change. Following a diverse set of perspectives as they share their responses to climate change. There is a lack of systematic analysis on the problems, but does express what the problems are, and provides hints of complexity. The book is an introduction to understanding the changing environmental, economic, and political structure of climate change.
cannonshipman's review against another edition
5.0
This book is essentially the opposite of "ignorance is bliss" in that almost every time I read it I felt a little bit worse about the world around me. If you've read in the news about investing in water as it becomes more scarce and are interested in more stories like that, this is the book for you. It does a great job of showing was that people are seeking to profit off of our changing climate, sometimes in ways that are fighting climate change, sometimes in ways that embrace it and cause further damage to the environment, and almost always in ways that are inequitable, consistently benefiting those with money, be it countries or people.
Overall, this was a fascinating, extremely worrying read, and is the type of book I would read updates from in a heartbeat, considering how much has changed in the 9 years since it was written (or hasn't changed, in terms of climate change trajectory and responsiveness of governments).
Overall, this was a fascinating, extremely worrying read, and is the type of book I would read updates from in a heartbeat, considering how much has changed in the 9 years since it was written (or hasn't changed, in terms of climate change trajectory and responsiveness of governments).
cannonshipman's review against another edition
5.0
This book is essentially the opposite of "ignorance is bliss" in that almost every time I read it I felt a little bit worse about the world around me. If you've read in the news about investing in water as it becomes more scarce and are interested in more stories like that, this is the book for you. It does a great job of showing was that people are seeking to profit off of our changing climate, sometimes in ways that are fighting climate change, sometimes in ways that embrace it and cause further damage to the environment, and almost always in ways that are inequitable, consistently benefiting those with money, be it countries or people.
Overall, this was a fascinating, extremely worrying read, and is the type of book I would read updates from in a heartbeat, considering how much has changed in the 9 years since it was written (or hasn't changed, in terms of climate change trajectory and responsiveness of governments).
Overall, this was a fascinating, extremely worrying read, and is the type of book I would read updates from in a heartbeat, considering how much has changed in the 9 years since it was written (or hasn't changed, in terms of climate change trajectory and responsiveness of governments).
squirrelfish's review against another edition
4.0
A good read, interesting in the breadth of industries he explores, and interviews from different perspectives, definitely worth a read/listen for someone interested in green jobs or climate change in general. I liked the discussions of private fire companies, and the brief history lesson there, as well as the exploration of patenting geoengineering ideas with Myrvhold's Intellectual Ventures. The farm land purchases in advance of climate change reminds me of the old speculative land purchases trying to predict railroads, and I wonder if these weather models will be more or less accurate? Overall, interesting and somewhat inspiring - there are definitely businesses to be built in anticipation of these changes.
venkyloquist's review against another edition
3.0
Global Warming is a threat that is as potent as any other dreadful calamity that can be envisaged as striking Earth in the near future. In spite of agenda backed opposition consisting of a phalanx of optimists who make a living pooh poohing ecologists, environmentalists and activists as naysayers, prophets of doom and inveterate pessimists, the fact that we are staring at an environmental disaster (predominantly man made) of gargantuan proportions is unmissable.
However can Global Warming trigger an upward shift in the monetary fortunes of a few daring and intrepid ‘prospectors’ willing to place impetuous bets on Climate Change? Are there people like that in the first place? Combining wicked wit and a wealth of research McKenzie Funk in this unique and revelatory book introduces us to a mind numbing world of pioneering profiteers, fascinating fund managers, boisterous business magnates and Wall Street experts who aspire to strike gold by pledging their bets on the topical phenomenon of Climate Change.
Traveling extensively to places obvious and obscure, Funk introduces us to an amazing group of people who make a literally booming business out of Global Warming. The dangerously melting Arctic is exploited by fund managers and oil majors alike to create pathways (The Northern Passage) and to drill deep for flushing out what is expected to be a treasure trove of oil and natural gas – an exercise that will resolve the woes of fuel guzzling carbon emitting powers in the higher north of the Globe.
Funk travels with a Wall Street raider to the dangerous and strife torn country of South Sudan where the former in a series of innovative and inventive deals with the rebel General procures hundreds of thousands of acres of fertile arable land at the cost of displacement and death suffered by hapless indigenous people. A precipitously rising sea level in island nations such as the Maldives, Kiribati and Tuvalu offers immense potential to Dutch engineering companies to peddle mind numbingly complex and gravity defying solutions such as the creation of entire floating cities – sprawling megapolises with stilts that are impervious to rising and gushing flows of water! Funk also gives us a ringside view of the scientific empire of the business tycoon Nathan Myhrvold, whose obsession with Geoengineering knows no limits or barriers even though the benefits arising out of such a process is to say the least – riddled with questions and credible doubts.
Funk does not despise the tactics or the strategies employed by these people in carving out personal and corporate fortunes by staking myriad claims permeating climate change. He only asks every stakeholder to engage in a thorough, realistic and reasonable introspection. He exhorts us to stop treating the subject of global warming as a Zero-sum game. Every winner need not prosper at the cost of a helpless and mutely obliging loser. Global warming and climate change makes no exception. It impacts all of us as part of a well-integrated and tightly knit humanity. Collaboration instead of commercial completion is the only lasting solution.
All the global stakeholders will do well to assimilate this message and act on it sooner rather than later if Mother Earth has to have a future.
However can Global Warming trigger an upward shift in the monetary fortunes of a few daring and intrepid ‘prospectors’ willing to place impetuous bets on Climate Change? Are there people like that in the first place? Combining wicked wit and a wealth of research McKenzie Funk in this unique and revelatory book introduces us to a mind numbing world of pioneering profiteers, fascinating fund managers, boisterous business magnates and Wall Street experts who aspire to strike gold by pledging their bets on the topical phenomenon of Climate Change.
Traveling extensively to places obvious and obscure, Funk introduces us to an amazing group of people who make a literally booming business out of Global Warming. The dangerously melting Arctic is exploited by fund managers and oil majors alike to create pathways (The Northern Passage) and to drill deep for flushing out what is expected to be a treasure trove of oil and natural gas – an exercise that will resolve the woes of fuel guzzling carbon emitting powers in the higher north of the Globe.
Funk travels with a Wall Street raider to the dangerous and strife torn country of South Sudan where the former in a series of innovative and inventive deals with the rebel General procures hundreds of thousands of acres of fertile arable land at the cost of displacement and death suffered by hapless indigenous people. A precipitously rising sea level in island nations such as the Maldives, Kiribati and Tuvalu offers immense potential to Dutch engineering companies to peddle mind numbingly complex and gravity defying solutions such as the creation of entire floating cities – sprawling megapolises with stilts that are impervious to rising and gushing flows of water! Funk also gives us a ringside view of the scientific empire of the business tycoon Nathan Myhrvold, whose obsession with Geoengineering knows no limits or barriers even though the benefits arising out of such a process is to say the least – riddled with questions and credible doubts.
Funk does not despise the tactics or the strategies employed by these people in carving out personal and corporate fortunes by staking myriad claims permeating climate change. He only asks every stakeholder to engage in a thorough, realistic and reasonable introspection. He exhorts us to stop treating the subject of global warming as a Zero-sum game. Every winner need not prosper at the cost of a helpless and mutely obliging loser. Global warming and climate change makes no exception. It impacts all of us as part of a well-integrated and tightly knit humanity. Collaboration instead of commercial completion is the only lasting solution.
All the global stakeholders will do well to assimilate this message and act on it sooner rather than later if Mother Earth has to have a future.
arguhlincozzi's review against another edition
This is actually a did not finish, because I can't do it. I know that climate change is real, a crucial topic to be addressing, and I do. I think about it daily, and as I make decisions on what to buy, who to vote for, and how I live my entire lifestyle. I support researchers who work on the topic. I do what I can, to both mitigate my household's impact and also try to help move society forward in a direction we need. But I can't manage reading this book - the casual destruction of the environment by so many governments and businesses in the name of the economy is too much for me to bear. It's a horror I can't abide to read so much detail about.
Funk writes engagingly, descriptively, and with an obvious amount of research, shining lights in dark shadows many of us are not privy to. Doesn't mean I am capable of looking, especially during Coronavirus times.
Funk writes engagingly, descriptively, and with an obvious amount of research, shining lights in dark shadows many of us are not privy to. Doesn't mean I am capable of looking, especially during Coronavirus times.
jnkay01's review against another edition
4.0
My review for The Associated Press: http://bigstory.ap.org/article/windfall-explores-business-climate-change
Apparently, if you look at climate change the right way, it looks like money instead of disaster — if you're looking at it from a corporate boardroom, for example, and not, say, coastal Bangladesh.
Journalist McKenzie Funk spent six years traveling the world to report "Windfall," his account of how governments and corporations — many of whom heavily contribute to the problem of global warming but balk at mandates to cut greenhouse gas emissions — are confronting climate change with engineering, money and lawyers. ... (to read more, follow the link above)
Apparently, if you look at climate change the right way, it looks like money instead of disaster — if you're looking at it from a corporate boardroom, for example, and not, say, coastal Bangladesh.
Journalist McKenzie Funk spent six years traveling the world to report "Windfall," his account of how governments and corporations — many of whom heavily contribute to the problem of global warming but balk at mandates to cut greenhouse gas emissions — are confronting climate change with engineering, money and lawyers. ... (to read more, follow the link above)
bluepigeon's review
5.0
Thank you GoodReads First Reads for a free copy of Windfall in exchange of my honest review.
I was a bit hesitant about starting Windfall, as I do not need to read a book about "the truth" of global warming or climate change. I was delightedly surprised to find that McKenzie Funk wrote, instead, a book that is truly as advertised: a book about the economics of climate change. As such, Funk reports expertly on the efforts of sovereign states, tiny islands, giant oil companies, think tanks, and various businesses who are/have been aiming to profit from the climate changes that are happening and are continuing to happen.
Funk travels to many places and meets with many influential men (all men, hmm...), who are all possibly small and large players in the next world war to come, whenever it may be. The book connects many dots with thin, invisible, tangible strings that bind the whole of Earth in a very tight and uncomfortable network; from the independence movement of Greenland to the wall of trees being built in Senegal to the wire fence India is building around Bangladesh to the snow machines that were inspired by the Russian gulags, Windfall witnesses the silent decisions that are shaping the future of humans and the Earth now.
Funk took six years to investigate and write this book, and a great job he has done. His writing is precise and crisp, with a good balance between every-day personal experiences and an account of his findings from his travels and interviews as well as his research.
Highly recommended for anyone interested in the politics of immigration, poverty, water rights, and international relations. Also recommended for anyone who has children or plans on having children. Expect a page-turner, albeit a rather bleak one (if you are socialist leaning, that is; otherwise a happy read, if you live and earn in the rich, Northern countries of the world.)
I was a bit hesitant about starting Windfall, as I do not need to read a book about "the truth" of global warming or climate change. I was delightedly surprised to find that McKenzie Funk wrote, instead, a book that is truly as advertised: a book about the economics of climate change. As such, Funk reports expertly on the efforts of sovereign states, tiny islands, giant oil companies, think tanks, and various businesses who are/have been aiming to profit from the climate changes that are happening and are continuing to happen.
Funk travels to many places and meets with many influential men (all men, hmm...), who are all possibly small and large players in the next world war to come, whenever it may be. The book connects many dots with thin, invisible, tangible strings that bind the whole of Earth in a very tight and uncomfortable network; from the independence movement of Greenland to the wall of trees being built in Senegal to the wire fence India is building around Bangladesh to the snow machines that were inspired by the Russian gulags, Windfall witnesses the silent decisions that are shaping the future of humans and the Earth now.
Funk took six years to investigate and write this book, and a great job he has done. His writing is precise and crisp, with a good balance between every-day personal experiences and an account of his findings from his travels and interviews as well as his research.
Highly recommended for anyone interested in the politics of immigration, poverty, water rights, and international relations. Also recommended for anyone who has children or plans on having children. Expect a page-turner, albeit a rather bleak one (if you are socialist leaning, that is; otherwise a happy read, if you live and earn in the rich, Northern countries of the world.)
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