The Conundrum

David Owen

The Conundrum is a mind-changing manifesto about the environment, efficiency, and the real path to sustainability.

Hybrid cars, fast trains, compact fluorescent light bulbs, solar panels, carbon offsets: everything you’ve been told about living green is wrong. In this elegant, fascinating narrative, David Owen takes you through the history of energy and the quest for efficiency, arguing that our best efforts are still at cross purposes to our true goal — living sustainably, and caring for our environment and the future of the planet. Efficiency, once considered the holy grail, turns out to be part of the problem. Improving efficiency and increasing sustainable development only exacerbate the problems they are meant to solve, more than negating the environmental gains.

This book will change how you look at the world. We should not be waiting for some geniuses to invent our way out of the energy and economic crisis we’re in. We already have the technology and knowledge we need to live sustainably. But will we do it?

That is the conundrum.

David Owen

Author photo
Laurie Gaboardi

David Owen is a staff writer for The New Yorker and the author of more than a dozen books. He lives in northwest Connecticut with his wife, the writer Ann Hodgman.

Website: davidowen.net