The Grid: The Fraying Wires Between Americans and Our Energy Future
Summary The US grid has been referred to as the world’s most complicated machine, and Bakke thinks this machine is at risk of breaking down. Bakke starts by describing the way that power moves through the grid into our homes and businesses. Once the basics are established, she gives a brief history of electricity’s early commercial use and the first versions of the grid that emerged as a result. The first grids were largely makeshift affairs, made to service single houses or a few blocks at a time. The technology was so new that there wasn’t a standard way of doing things. This created a lot of headaches and made electricity expensive and fragile. It was the monopolist Samuel Insull who would bring order to the chaos in the industry. By buying up hundreds of these independent electricity producers, he turned electricity into a standardized product that the masses could afford. This was the beginning of the modern grid as we know it. ...