{"product_id":"the-next-great-thing-the-sun-the-stirling-engine-and-the-drive-to-change-the-world-0393334031","title":"The Next Great Thing: The Sun, the Stirling Engine and the Drive to Change the World","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eISBN:\u003c\/strong\u003e 0393334031\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eAuthor:\u003c\/strong\u003e Shelton, Mark L.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eCondition:\u003c\/strong\u003e New\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eGlobal warming, Arctic oil drilling, and the vanishing ozone layer are all enormous environmental problems with no clear solutions - or so conventional wisdom goes. But in the tiny town of Appalachian, Ohio, a small group of engineers under the guidance of a visionary eccentric named William Beale is challenging that conventional wisdom in an audacious attempt to transform the way the world makes and uses energy. Their \"ultimate machine\" - a solar-powered Stirling engine - resembles nothing the world has ever seen, and it carries an enormous burden of hope for the future of the planet. Should they succeed, a patch of desert 170 miles square could generate all the energy needs of the United States virtually pollution-free. Mark Shelton's exciting narrative takes us inside the laboratories and engine shops of Sunpower, Inc., where Beale and his colleagues are harnessing space-age technology to an idea as old as the steam engine. A working prototype of the Stirling engine is already capable of running an individual house, but enormous obstacles remain: lack of funding, and the preference of the American public and private sectors for getting their energy the good old-fashioned way. Like Tracy Kidder's Soul of a New Machine, Shelton's insightful account has the inherent drama of a report from the frontier, a frontier that might well produce the next great technological advance for the human race.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Mia Karts","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51855923609888,"sku":"NEW0393334031","price":25.86,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0980\/7426\/3840\/files\/61oYyXoTeoL.jpg?v=1781543792","url":"https:\/\/miakarts.com\/products\/the-next-great-thing-the-sun-the-stirling-engine-and-the-drive-to-change-the-world-0393334031","provider":"Miakarts Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}