A Thought of Yesterday

By
Butch Criswell

When I first started out working as a young man, I pumped gas. The price of a gallon of regular (which we do not have any more) was 13.9 cents, unleaded was 14.9, and Premium was 17.9. You could by a can of oil for fifty cents and diesel was 8.9 per gallon. A lot people used to pay with change, 50 cents would buy you 2-3 gallons and get you home on a Friday night, and very few people had credit cards. Times were different then, simpler more of a slower pace. Now look at me 40 years later, paying over three dollars a gallon, using my credit card for everything, because if you do want to pay cash they look at you funny and it takes them longer top do it. Yep, there is a direct connection to gas and the prices we pay for everything. This is how the world works, this how energy dominates, and this is where renewable hope can bring our country back to a more favorable time when tootsie rolls and double bubble was a penny. Well I can hope big.

Oysters that do indeed give something Back

By


Butch Criswell

If you had told me a year ago I would be writing about marine energy, I would tell you were nuts. Thus, this where I am at; apparently the Irish have done it again. They have developed wave power according to the European Marine Energy Center. The Aquamarine Power Oyster is what the device is called. It is designed to capture energy from land shelf waves, submerged between 8-16 meters of water. Each time a wave passes over the oyster it send s high-pressure water to the land-based hydroelectric generators. The oyster has already proven its worth, since it has been producing electricity on the grid since November 2009. Aquamarine has plans for phase two of the project; they will be linking three of their oysters to one generator. They are looking at different setups and possibilities for manufacture by 2013.

References

Appleyard, D. (2010). Marine Energy: Daring To Be Different. Tulsa: Renewable Energy World Magazine.

The U.S. Next Step, Build A New Electrical Grid

Pierce, A. (2009). Building a Smart National U.S. Power Grid. Tech Directions, 68(9), 10-11. Retrieved from Academic Search Premier database.


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By

Butch Criswell

One of President Obama’s promises was to increase renewable energy supplies by 10%, and reduce this country’s dependence on foreign oil, by the end of his first term in office. There is no reason why American ingenuity cannot in part come half way, and who is going to tie it all together. In the new economic stimulus bill, there is $4.5billion for smart grid activation. This will help tie together the wind and solar power to our national electric grid; we first have to modify the three primary grids we have currently. One of the problems faced is blackouts, when consumption is high. The conversations have been with two-way switch conversions for appliances and homes. These would be strictly voluntary for lower electric rates. This is fine, but we still need storage and the present way of doing that is not up to today’s standards. This is why congress put in monies just for this upgrade for all grid storage facilities. When electric cars become the norm, we will have to worry about peak time and low demand time for charging. Isn’t funny what the future will bring.

Earthquakes Not the Cause of Geothermal Drilling

Armistead, T. (2009). Geothermal Projects Not a Seismic Threat. ENR: Engineering News-Record, 2631. Retrieved from Academic Search Premier database.


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By

Butch Criswell

Geothermal experts are now downplaying that induced seismicity has nothing to do with (EGS) enhanced geothermal systems. Due to a report of a 2.7 magnitude tremor in the city of Landau, Germany, just this last August. The plants officials of Geox GmbH deny their plant had anything to do with the tremor, and are continuing plant operations, while experts slowly and painstakingly look over the data. Dry geothermal is more widely available than normal geo resources, that is way the U.S. Dept. of Energy has on the books 21 research and development programs, and four demonstration facilities. Defenders of the practice say caution is needed, but let us not over react, we have been drilling oil and gas in the deep crust for years successfully. The leader of the MIT report in 2009 given to the DOE explains that what happen Landau is the same thing that happened in Basel. These companies need to understand that, probability studies must include loss of life and property damage. To date there has been no loss of life or property damage in Landau.

Ball State University’s geothermal system will be largest in the country

(2009). Ball State Is Building Nation's Largest Geothermal System. ASHRAE Journal, 51(10), 7. Retrieved from Academic Search Premier database.

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By
Butch Criswell

Muncie, Indiana will be home the largest geothermal system in the country in the next five to eight years. John Lund, the director of the geoheat center at Oregon Institute of Technology says, “These larger projects maybe something we will see more of in the future.” Ball State President Jo Ann Gora got the ball literally going when she signed the American College and University President’s Climate Commitment in 1991. When completed the $65 million system will save the university $2 million a year in fuel cost. The main disadvantage to the system is the high up-front cost. The university has spent $41 million in the first phase alone, will replace two coal-fired boilers, which the university still has in use. Once the system is fully functional it will be able to heat more than 45 buildings on 660-acre campus.

Nikola Tesla, Father of Modern Electricity

By


Butch Criswell

In the last few weeks, we have been talking and writing about energy; it’s applications, how we harness it, and the distribution of that energy to the populace. The one question I have asked myself through all of this was who started the different genres of different energy applications. Surely in this environmental/beatnik society we have created, there has to be heroes. Heroes other than the founders of Greenpeace and Peta; I mean the real life heroes that used scientific knowledge to give us the basis for what we have today. Scientists such as Nikola Tesla, a real hero of the twentieth century and one of the founding fathers of hydroelectricity we use today, among many other things.

Nikola Tesla was born July 10, 1856 in Smiljan, Lika, what was then the Austo-Hungarian Empire, region of Croatia. His father Milutin Tesla was a Serbian Orthodox Priest, and his mother Djuka Mandic was an inventor of household appliances. Tesla studied at the Realschule, Karlstadt in 1873, and the Polytechnic Institute in Graz, Austria and the University of Prague. Tesla was going to study math and physics, but became mesmerized about electrical energy. He then switched to electrical engineering and never looked back. In 1883 while working for the Continental Edison Company in Paris, he built a small prototype of the AC induction motor that is widely used today in many appliances. Tesla left Europe and headed to New York and his dream of harnessing the mighty Niagara Falls.

Once in New York he started working for Thomas Edison, as his personal assistant in his lab in New Jersey. This is where these two great men had a falling out over DC and AC currents and its applications. George Westinghouse appeared before Tesla after giving a speech to the Institute of Electrical engineers in 1888. Together, they both beat Edison and started a new era in electrical energy, which is still the standard today. Tesla saved his greatest accomplishment to humanity for last, and in 1895 built the first hydroelectric power plant , which was the final vindication for alternating current. Tesla’s discoveries are numerous to the point of ridiculous they are the fluorescent light , laser beam, wireless communications, and wireless transmission of electrical energy, the remote control, robotics, and Tesla’s vertical takeoff aircraft. Tesla is the real father of the radio and the modern electrical transmissions systems. He registered over 700 patents worldwide. His vision included exploration of solar energy and the power of the sea. He foresaw interplanetary communications and satellites. Tesla has so many other contributions to humankind that cannot be mentioned in this forum. However, the father of radio might through you a little. In 1901 Marconi, established radio contact with Great Britain and Canada and won the Nobel Peace Prize. All of Marconi’s work was based on other people’s ideas, and one in particular was the patented diagrams of a radio system Tesla had invented and patented in 1896. Tesla was not about to let Marconi, have credit for his radio system. In 1943, the United States Supreme Court found Marconi’s patented invalid, and recognized Tesla as the inventor of radio technology. Nikola Tesla died January 7, 1943 in the Hotel New Yorker, where he lived the last ten years of his life. Tesla was penniless at the time of his death.



References

Vujovic, D. L. (1998, July 10). Tesla Society. Retrieved April 9, 2010, from Tesla Memorial Society of New York: www.teslasociety.com/biography.htm

Solar Trees

By
Butch Criswell

In these days and times it is refreshing to have made a discovery that is so profound even though it is three years old; the solar tree. When, I first saw this tree design. I was amused and astonished that something of this sort could come from a crude rectangle and the same ole’ linear lines. Ross Lovegrove, a British designer, who said that they are not only efficient but also attractive and bring “nature into a gray city environment, designed the tree". The idea came from Peter Noever, Director of the Austrian Museum for Applied Arts in Vienna, and putting this design together was a dual role. Italian lighting designer, Artemide teamed up with Sharp Solar from Germany and brought the design to life.

The city of Vienna had the lights on display for two months and decided the results of the trees were outstanding. Christina Werner from cultural project management was delighted by the results; she said that even when there was no direct sunlight for four days, the lamps still had enough energy to light those sections of the city properly. The solar powered trees helped slash the Vienna’s energy bill and carbon emissions. Christina Werner has put forth a proposal for more trees, and it is her hope that the rest of Europe will follow suite and start replacing city lighting gradually. The United States should look into this type of design technology. I would rather have something that pleasing to the eye than a dingy erector set, setting around rusting.

References
Burgermeister, J. (2007, December 21). Introducing the Solar Tree. Retrieved April 8, 2010, from Renewable Energy World: www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2007/12/introducing-the-solar-tree-50934