From the Prologue

"...Yet somewhere along the line, an idea that was once fun and adventurous has begun to resemble a political and "moral" mandate, and now solar and wind technologies are burdened with the task of saving the world from the perils of human meddling. It's the sort of thing that happens when scientists crawl into bed with politicians. 

"Power with Nature is not about political agendas or scientific prophesies, however, and nowhere will I denigrate you for your addiction to gasoline, your love of red meat from methane-farting cows, or the embarrassing size of your carbon footprint. It's not that kind of book. For while I am indeed proud to be personally involved with the clean technologies that will one day replace fossil fuels, that's not the reason I'm in it. It's much simpler than that: I like being in control of my own energy usage and production, and I thoroughly enjoy dreaming up energy-conserving strategies and tactics that would never occur to anyone not living off the grid with limited energy resources. 

"I therefore hope to show you in some detail the most promising renewable energy technologies and how they can save you money and make you more self-reliant. I would also like to instill in you the same sense of wonder I feel every time I wire together a solar array or a battery bank, or climb my wind tower for a little routine maintenance on my Bergey XL-1 wind turbine. Because for all the things renewable energy may or may not be, it is, first and foremost, really fascinating technology that has the added benefit of being a helluva lot of fun. If I am able to get that much across, then I will have done my job."
— Rex A. Ewing