The Grid

Despite the oft-repeated warnings about our dependence on foreign oil, America runs not on gasoline or even coal, or solar, or nuclear powerwe run on electricity. Without it our economy would come to a near-instantaneous stop: banks, manufacturing, food storage, shipping, technologyyou name it, we'd lose it. Even the majority of our farming would be stopped or severely limited. And yet blackouts and brownouts are happening with steadily growing frequency. In 2003, a single sagging power line near Akron, OH blacked out the homes of some 50 million people across the Northeast, including into Canada. The White House itself has lost power at least 4 times since 2000. How can the support system for something so essential be so rickety and vulnerable?In entertaining, perceptive, deeply researched fashion, cultural anthropologist Gretchen Bakke uses the history of an increasingly outdated electrical infrastructure to show how the United States has gone from...