Superpower: One Man's Quest to Transform American Energy

“With propulsive storytelling, Russell Gold presents one of America’s most ambitious and groundbreaking projects for renewable energy. Following larger-than-life men and women seeking to reshape the current energy landscape, Superpower is an essential, compelling look into the future of the nation’s power grid.”

—Bryan Burrough, author of Public Enemies and The Big Rich

In the ever more urgent quest for sources of renewable energy, meet the man boldly harnessing the natural forces that could power America’s future.

The United States is in the midst of an energy transition. We want to embrace renewable energy sources like wind and solar, and rely less on dirty fossil fuels. We don’t want to keep pumping so many heat-trapping gases into the atmosphere. But any transition from a North American power grid that uses mostly fossil fuels to one that is predominantly clean requires a massive building spree—billions of dollars’ worth.

Enter Michael Skelly, an infrastructure builder who began working on wind energy in 2000, when many considered the industry a joke. Eight years later, Skelly helped create the second largest wind power company in the United States—which was sold for $2 billion. Wind energy was no longer funny; it was well on its way to generating a substantial percentage of the electricity in the United States.

Acclaimed journalist and author of The Boom , “the best all-around book yet on fracking” (San Francisco Chronicle), Russell Gold tells the story of this pioneer whose innovations, struggles, and persistence represent the groundbreaking changes underway in American energy. In Superpower, we meet Skelly’s financial backers, a family that pivoted from oil exploration to renewable energy; the farmers ready to embrace the new “cash crop”; the landowners prepared to go to court to avoid looking at overhead wires; and utility executives who concoct fiendish ways to block renewable energy. Thrilling, provocative, and important, Superpower is a fascinating look at America’s future.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Russell Gold has reported on energy regularly in The Wall Street Journal since 2002. His coverage of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill was honored with a Gerald Loeb Award and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. He lives in Austin, Texas.

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