The Engineer: Follow Elon Musk on a Journey from South Africa to Mars

Начало книги

The history of The Engineer – Follow Elon Musk on a journey from South Africa to Mars began in 2006 when I read a book about peak oil. The idea behind peak oil is that the world sooner or later will run out of oil because oil is a finite resource. Most books written on the subject are within the doomsday category. The book I read argued that when there’s no more oil we would be forced to return to a 19th century society. Horses would be the main mode of transportation because the alternatives, such as electric cars, wouldn’t make a difference because they weren’t good enough.

Peak oil terrified me. The first night I had nightmares about how the world would look like without any vehicles. How would we deliver food? How would we build houses? How would we transport injured people? I watched every day how the price of oil climbed to record levels. But when the 2008 credit crisis hit the world, the price of oil decreased from $150 per barrel, and nightmares about derivatives replaced my nightmares about peak oil.

Читать дальше →