our country but also because of America’s role in the world. America serves as a model for industrialization, and so the American embrace of waste and pollution encourages others to follow the same path of growing their economies first and attempting to clean things up later. This is a serious problem because it is too late: the world has already passed the point at which global warming is certain. Climate change is a reality, and neither the United States nor any other country can put off change. The entire world is in the midst of such a serious and universal change that we should restart the numbering system used for our history: rather than BC or AD, we are now living in the ECE: the Energy-Climate Era.

The second half of Hot, Flat, and Crowded focuses on the many specific actions that America and the world can and should take to save itself (and the world). Friedman’s first suggestion is that the current trends of businesses saying they’ve already gone green, or people looking for easy ways to save the earth, are dangerous. The danger is that these actions aren’t enough, and this false sense of ease, combined with the trendiness of such movements, may lead people to think that the ecological crisis has already been addressed. Instead, the world needs a massive and coordinated effort because climate change is global, unprecedented, and (because of the complexity of the system) unpredictable. Friedman suggests it might be better to call what’s coming “global weirding” rather than “global warming” because the results will be so strange. These changes will increase, rather than decreasing or flattening out, because the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is projected to double by the middle of the twenty-first century and to triple by 2075.

There are many things that can and should be done to address this crisis: increase carbon capture in coal-plants, replace existing coal plants and make old ones more efficient, build nuclear plants, increase wind and solar power capacities many times over, and shift cars to hydrogen use. As we do this, we need to use farming practices that conserve land reduce CO2 production, stop cutting and burning forests, reduce the distances driven by the average car, and institute energy conservation practices everywhere.

A crucial step in this is making the energy grid less “dumb.” Friedman points out that the existing energy grid in America grew piecemeal, and it is administered the same way—and in ways that reward waste rather than conservation. The economics of energy must be made functional so that conservation and efficiency are rewarded. Making the grid “intelligent,” so that energy use is continually monitored and shifted according to need, will make this much easier. This “Energy Internet” will allow people to make better choices and even sell power back to the utilities. (This has already been tested on a small scale in Washington state and produced a drop in energy use.)

Government involvement is essential in making this change for several reasons. First, there is no free market in energy at present: current policies reward and protect existing energy. Worse, the current system does not give genuine signals about cost and need, which distorts both individual actions and corporate investment. Second, the world needs an exponential breakthrough and stable policies that reward long-term research and investment in alternatives to give inventors and investors alike time to see developments. Third, consistent government policies for fuel efficiency and pollution must set standards for industry production. This will require a reversal of recent American policies, which have relaxed standards to make things easier for American industry in the short term (and thus rewarded wasteful and inefficient industries).

While global and national action is essential, involving local communities—down to the level of villages and family farms—is equally essential. Right now the most lucrative way for many rural communities in places like Indonesia or Brazil to enter the global economies is by either destroying the remnants of precious ecosystems (such as burning rainforests to clear farmland or cutting trees for lumber) or through poaching rare species. The world needs the biological richness found in these remaining natural systems and so must make it more profitable to maintain the ecosystems intact. Local villagers must be trained as stewards and guides and taught how to do sustainable agriculture.

Making these changes will require the United States to engage in tricky negotiations over its national identity. On one hand, authoritarian governmental directives like those employed in China offer tremendous possibilities for positive reform. China banned free plastic bags on June 1, 2008, pushing 1.3 billion people to find other ways to transport goods home from stores—and conserving countless barrels of petroleum. On the other hand, we need the explosion of innovations that comes from free market exploration of alternatives. To complicate things still further, going green is often associated with the left—but moving toward greater energy efficiency is highly patriotic, and it is one of the things the country can do to save troops' lives. Setting up bases in Iraq is incredibly energy expensive, and transporting the fuel needed to run generators continually leaves American service personnel at risk of attack. Insulating tents and finding better ways to use solar power makes these soldiers far safer. This sort of innovation will also spread over into civilian benefits, both at home and in Iraq.

In the end, democracy will have to adapt to changing climate conditions, which will in turn produce changing economic conditions. A new kind of leadership will be required, one that is loyal to established American values but also brave enough to deal with entrenched interest groups—and bold enough to establish new visions of what is possible. If America can produce this sort of leadership, this crisis may become another opportunity and America may remain a world leader. If America cannot make such changes, it will fade from prominence, becoming an economic backwater or even perishing all together. That's how serious the current crisis is.

A note on historical figures in the work: While Friedman tries to bring his work to life through personal interviews with numerous individuals around the globe, none play a major role in the book as a whole. This is, Friedman argues, a global crisis requiring collective action, and so there are really no individual characters.