Mississippi for Alternative Energy

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Comment by garyd on November 3, 2008 at 6:20pm

I would like to know if Rose has a website about their home.
I would like to make my home 100 % solar energy. I have got a good start but need a lot more info.
thanks
Gary

Comment by Michael, Houston on November 1, 2008 at 7:24am

Thousands of new GREEN JOBS are now posted on GREEN JOBS NOW! group page. Join the group today and we will keep you informed. http://push.pickensplan.com/group/greenjobsnowcom
Tell your friends looking for a job to sign up on the PickensPlan and upload their resume FREE at: www.green-jobs-now.com
Melissa
coordinator@green-jobs-now.com

Comment by Mike Anthony Fernald Sr. on October 23, 2008 at 11:31am

Comment by Bruce Eric Montgomery on October 16, 2008 at 12:23pm

Report: 4.2 million new 'green' jobs possible

WASHINGTON — A major shift to renewable energy and efficiency is expected to produce 4.2 million new environmentally friendly "green" jobs over the next three decades, according to a study commissioned by the nation's mayors.

The study to be released Thursday by the U.S. Conference of Mayors, says that about 750,000 people work today in what can be considered green jobs from scientists and engineers researching alternative fuels to makers of wind turbines and more energy-efficient products.

But that's less than one half of 1 percent of total employment. By 2038, another 4.2 million green jobs are expected to be added, accounting for 10 percent of new job growth over the next 30 years, according to the report by Global Insight, Inc.

"It could be the fastest growing segment of the United States economy over the next several decades and dramatically increase its share of total employment," said the report, obtained Wednesday by The Associated Press.

However, the study cautioned such job growth won't be realized without an aggressive shift away from traditional fossil fuels toward alternative energy and a significant improvement in energy efficiency.

For example, it assumes by 2038 alternative energy will account for 40 percent of electricity production with half of that coming from wind and solar; widespread retrofitting of buildings to achieve a 35 percent reduction in electricity use; and 30 percent of motor fuels coming from ethanol or biodiesel.

Alternative energy such as wind, geothermal, biomass and solar, currently accounts for less than 3 percent of electricity generation and nonfossil sources such as ethanol and biodiesel about 5 percent of all motor fuels, the report notes.

Miami Mayor Manny Diaz, the conference's president, said the report makes "a very compelling economic argument for investing in the green economy and that we're going to get a huge return for it."

"These are things we have to do," said Diaz in a telephone interview, adding that "Washington needs to get on the train."

Presidential candidate Barack Obama has cited the jobs potential if the country embraces alternative energy and efficiency.

Democratic nominee Barack Obama predicts investments in a "clean energy economy" over the next 10 years "will help the private sector create 5 million new green jobs" — a more ambitious projection than outlined by the study provided the mayors.

The report, being presented at a mayor's conference in Miami, predicts the biggest job gain will be from the increased use of alternative transportation fuels, with 1.5 million additional jobs, followed by the renewable power generating sector with 1.2 million new jobs. Another 81,000 additional jobs will be generated by industries related to making homes and commercial buildings more energy efficient, the study said.

And it predicted an additional 1.4 million green jobs related to engineering, research, consulting and legal work.

"We're trying to show the size of the green jobs economy" assuming policy shifts toward less dependence on fossil fuels, said Jim Diffley of Global Insight.

Comment by Whit Perry on September 13, 2008 at 9:19am

I am not an expert on energy. I am just concerned for our country and the way we have been raped over the last few years. Whenever a storm comes over the gas prices soar, just as they have done in the past few days with Hurricane Ike. I do know that we have to quit sitting on the sidelines waiting for a miracle to solve the energy crisis we are in. We have to continue and try to get T. Boone Pickens' message out to everyone in this country and contacts our government officials and let them know we are sick of this mess they have allowed us to get in. I will try to help do whatever I can, if t is just writing to my friends and getting the to come onboard. I have downloaded many copies of the T. Boone Pickens' Energy Independence Pledge and will ask everyone I come into contact with if they would be willing to sign this and will fax it myself for them. Whatever the plan, we have to act or we will be paying all of our salaries for fuel and taxes.

Comment by Grandpa AL on September 6, 2008 at 7:22am

Does this look like it is hurting the caribou? I agree with Eric. We have enough Natural Gas to last 100 years.

For the benefit of those who did not notice, when Gustav came through the center of oil production in the Gulf Of Mexico this past week, Not one oil spill occurred. Yet this is one of the reasons used to say we cannot drill offshore.
I agree totally we need all forms of energy to get away from foreign dependence. Yet, we have to drill where the oil is, which happens to be offshore. We have already explored all the locations on land with the exception of the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge. Just this one formation contains 4 billion to 10 billion barrels of oil. For another viewpoint of ANWR go to:
http://www.anwr.org By the way the picture above is from a similiar location in Alaska.

I supervised the drilling of many oil and gas wells. Some offshore in Mobile Bay where nothing was allowed to go overboard, not even a glass of water. We did it safely, and environmentally friendly. That was over 20 years ago. The days of gusher wells blowing oil through the derrick are long gone. Modern drilling methods can leave a very small foot print and when they are finished, the land is restored as it was before.
As T. Boone says, we cannot drill our way out of this crisis, but we still need to pursue all forms of energy as we transform our economy to more green methods.

I have not worked for an oil company for over 19 years, but I understand the working of the oil industry from the geology, drilling, production, and transport end.
I am not an apologist for Oil Companies, only a realist. We need immediate help, before a crisis or terrorist event throws our country into a tailspin.

ALL FOREIGN OIL COMES IN BY TANKERS, an even greater risk of spills, while our offshore drilling is transported by pipeline to our refineries.

Remember the Exxon Valdez oil spill? I worked for Exxon to clean up that spill as one of the safety directors. I know the problems first hand, I saw the damage. It can happen again as we transport oil to our country by tankers. It is much safer to use pipelines.

I believe we need to drill our own oil, instead of sitting on our hands while China and other countries drill off Florida in international waters and use modern angle drilling to tap into our nations reserves and steal them from you the citizens of this country. Is that what you want?
Here is a short quote:
"Chinese firms are planning to slant drill off the Cuban coast near the Florida Straits, tapping into U.S. oil reserves that are estimated at 4.6 billion to 9.3 billion barrels. This compares with 4 billion to 10 billion barrels believed to be beneath the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge"
Want to read more go to:
http://www.americanfreepress.net/html/china_starts_oil_drilling.html
Please just consider these thoughts from an 61 year old grandpa who wants the best for this country and my 15 grand children.

Yes, I want to get off oil as soon as possible and pursue all other forms of energy, but we need a stop gap plan in place to help us get there.
God Bless
Grandpa AL

Comment by Eric Williams on September 2, 2008 at 8:56pm

I dont know about windmills in Mississippi, but I do know Natural Gas exploration. From staking wells, running pipelines, surveying drilling units and all the other things my profession does for the industry, let me say that we have the natural gas here in Mississippi to help solve the energy problem.

Comment by Leslie Baker on August 30, 2008 at 3:46pm

Hello group.. I am new today. I live in North Mississippi and have heard about this "plan" for a while now. I would appreciate any suggestions or ideas and would like to know what we can do to help.

Comment by Bruce Eric Montgomery on August 30, 2008 at 12:57pm

SPECIAL REPORT: ALTERNATIVE ENERGY POWERS UP

Enter the New American Dream House

This Oregon couple's home hits a standard few others have achieved: It's completely energy self-sufficient.

Here's how:

Four years ago, Linda Rose and her husband, Eldon Haines, realized it might soon be time to consolidate -- and reinvent -- their family living arrangements. The retired couple lives in Eugene, Ore., where they have to negotiate 46 stairs from curb to doorstep every time they venture out. So the couple decided to build their own version of a dream retirement home in Rose's daughter's backyard in Portland, Ore.

The two life-long environmentalists didn't want just another house, however. The pair already burned old newspapers and cardboard in their wood stove and recycled or reused all plastic. They're proud to boast that they have generated two garbage cans of waste a year for the past 20 years.

EARTHLY PURSUIT. Haines, a nuclear physicist, has worked for decades as a consultant to NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab, most recently on the Mars Odyssey unmanned spacecraft. But he's also known nationwide as the inventor of the copper cricket, a solar water heater. "My real-life interest is the environment, not planet Mars," he likes to point out.

So it was only natural that the couple set out to build a home that generates all the energy it needs to run appliances, heating, and cooling. It's a pioneering effort in Oregon and one of the first in the nation.

These so-called net-energy homes go a step beyond the "zero-energy homes" promoted by the federal government, explains Charlie Stephens, residential energy specialist at the Oregon Energy Dept. in Salem. To qualify as zero-energy, a home need only generate enough electricity for 70% to 80% of its needs. The Rose House (that's what the owners like to call it), completed this summer, is energy self-sufficient, period.

MORE AFFORDABLE Such homes are at the cutting edge of alternative energy. Fewer than 500 zero-energy homes exist in the U.S. today, and net-energy homes are even rarer. One being constructed in the oceanfront community of Canon Beach, Ore., will store hot water in wells drilled through basalt several hundred feet down. The idea is to store heat in the stone to be siphoned into the house later. Clever as this system is, it costs several thousand dollars extra. You won't find one in the aisles of Home Depot (HD ) or Lowes (LOW ).

The Rose House takes a different design path. It's plainer and more affordable than most such experiments. In fact, this one-story, green-colored home with a steepled roof looks deceptively normal. Set in a quiet residential neighborhood, it's surrounded by tall sunflowers and beds of tomatoes and squash. It only has 800 square feet of living space: two bedrooms and one bathroom.



The Rose House's owners received $27,750 worth of government grants from the likes of the Energy Trust of Oregon for the construction. With the grants figured in, they estimate they spent about $146 per square foot to build the home. That's 22% more than Portland's going price of $120 per square foot for a standard home. But because Rose and Haines will have no energy bills to pay, they'll save hundreds of dollars each year.

HIGHER RESALE VALUES. The economics might turn out to be even more favorable as utilities start to pay for electricity that residential customers generate. In Tennessee solar-home owners receive 15 cents per kilowatt hour produced (an average solar home produces 6,000 kilowatt hours a year). They pay only 6 cents per kilowatt hour that they buy from the utility. That's one of the more generous deals in the nation.

Builders in California have found that energy-efficient homes have a higher resale value than traditional homes, says John Suppes, president of Clarum Homes, which expects to have built 277 zero-energy homes in California by yearend.

A June survey of 600 Californians conducted for Environment California Research & Policy Center indicated that 63% of respondents said they would pay more for a solar home.

In Oregon, the Rose House doubles as a research lab, monitored by scientists from Oregon Institute of Technology, among others, and some of its features could show up in new housing developments to be built in the state capital of Salem in 2006. Sensors dispersed throughout the home measure temperature of the exterior and interior walls and on the roof. Energy generation and consumption is constantly monitored. For the next two years this data will be fed to researchers and builders throughout the state -– and soon onto the Web for anyone to see.

HOT AIR AT WORK. The reason for the study, in part, is to motivate more builders to construct energy-efficient homes. The Rose House was recently featured on a local "Build It Green!" tour, showcasing 20 Portland homes incorporating innovative environmental ideas. "My hope is that anyone would be able to see themselves in it," says Clark Brockman, project manager at SERA Architects in Portland, who designed the house. "That they don't think of a net-energy house as something out of a sci-fi movie."

Space-age technology is certainly at the core of the experiment. Part of the house's south-facing roof is covered with 300 square feet of solar panels that should produce 6,000 kilowatt hours a year (a typical American household spends 2,000 kilowatt hours a year on lighting alone). A special system sucks in hot air from underneath the solar panels -- it's typically heated to more than 100 degrees -- and uses it to heat water and air inside the house.

In addition, Haines's invention, the copper cricket, uses the sun's energy during the summer to heat water. Together these contraptions should produce enough hot water for a hot shower.

"MORE ALIVE." A special energy-recovery ventilator -- a file-cabinet-size box -- recaptures heat leaving the house and recycles it. A big part of creating an energy-efficient home is an air-tight design. In a typical older home the whole volume of air escapes through cracks and crannies in less than an hour. In an energy-efficient home, walls, roof, and foundation are designed to reduce this air exchange to once every three hours or even longer.

The Rose House features so-called staggered-stud walls, which prevent heat from leaving the house and the cold from entering it. And its special air-exchange system prevents the house from becoming too stuffy. "You can almost feel the house breathing in the night," says Haines. "It feels more alive."

Haines hopes that as more people see his house, they'll feel it, too, and follow his lead.

Comment by Bruce Eric Montgomery on August 24, 2008 at 11:31am

Solar Power Conference and Expo, Reflecting Global Scope and Growth, Becomes Solar Power International

Industry Recognizes Solar Power International as Crucial Event to Conduct Global Business

Solar Power International
WASHINGTON--(www.push.pickensplan.com)--Today the Solar Electric Power Association (SEPA) and the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA), the two nonprofits that have presented the Solar Power Conference and Expo since 2004, announced that effective immediately, the event will be renamed Solar Power International. The new name and logo reflect soaring international participation and underscore the global scope of both the conference agenda and the expo floor. Solar Power International, taking place October 13-16, 2008, at the San Diego Convention Center, is the largest solar event in the Americas and the premiere destination for global solar companies conducting business in the United States.

The event now known as Solar Power International has grown an unprecedented 40 percent every year since its inception five years ago. This year the organizers expect more than 15,000 attendees, including solar industry professionals, utility executives, investors, engineers and policymakers, with an international contingent of more than 1,500 hailing from at least 70 countries. In 2004 the expo floor had only four exhibitors from outside the U.S. This year the expo features 110 companies based outside the U.S., approximately 25 percent of the total 425 exhibitors.

“Over the past five years we have continually reshaped our event to address the evolving needs of the industry and offer an indispensable link for solar professionals traversing the globe,” said Julia Hamm, executive director of SEPA and chair of Solar Power International. “This year we will welcome more international visitors than our event’s total attendance in 2004. We recognize the solar industry is defined by international exchange, and it remains our top priority to provide a comprehensive, business-to-business event that engages a worldwide audience, highlights global solar innovation and provides the unparalleled networking opportunities our attendees have come to expect.”

“Solar manufacturers, suppliers and other industry participants are global and operate in a global marketplace – even the smallest installer company is affected,” said Rhone Resch, president of SEIA. “As the U.S. solar energy industry has grown, this conference has become an essential event for global solar energy companies that want to do business in the thriving U.S. market. The strong influx of international attendees is an indication of America’s potential to attract investment, create more green-collar jobs and regain our leadership position.”

“The global solar industry increases in size and complexity with each passing year, and the organizers of Solar Power International have kept pace by expanding the conference program while retaining its quality and accessibility,” said Ron Kenedi, vice president of Sharp Solar Energy Solutions Group (SESG), a subsidiary of Sharp Electronics Corp. and the U.S. solar arm of Sharp Corp. “The market for solar energy knows no borders, and Solar Power International continues to be an important event for us to engage with partners and customers from around the world. The event’s location in the heart of the American solar industry is especially significant because global companies like ours have recognized the growth potential of the U.S. market.”

A highlight of the Solar Power International agenda is the annual CEO Panel, which brings together industry leaders from the United States, Spain and Germany to discuss worldwide market development and reducing technology costs. The conference will also feature opening and closing keynote sessions and more than 60 breakout sessions. The 174,000-square-foot expo floor features 425 exhibitors from every corner of the solar industry. Together the conference program and expo floor encompass the complete range of solar energy technologies, including photovoltaics, concentrating photovoltaics, concentrating solar power, solar hot water and space heating and cooling.

Although almost exclusively a business-to-business event, Solar Power International will continue to expand its focus on consumers through a partnership with the nonprofit California Center for Sustainable Energy (CCSE). Solar Power International coincides with San Diego’s annual Solar Energy Week, creating a comprehensive, week-long schedule addressing both professional and consumer solar interests. Activities for the public will include Family Solar Day on October 12, a public opening of the Solar Power International expo floor on the evening of October 15 and the Tour of Solar Homes on October 18. San Diego Gas & Electric, the Utility Host Sponsor for Solar Power International, will also be promoting Solar Energy Week activities to both its commercial and residential customers.

Last year’s event sold out in advance, so organizers encourage early registration to guarantee participation. To register, find more information and sign up to receive speaker and session updates, please visit www.solarpowerinternational.com.

The Solar Electric Power Association bridges electric utilities and the solar industry to push solar forward more tangibly, one real business at a time. From national conferences to one-on-one counseling and peer matching services, SEPA’s unique joint partnership offers members critical access to the key business relationships and unbiased, actionable intelligence needed to make solar practical and profitable in today’s shifting energy landscape.

www.solarelectricpower.org

Solar Energy Industries Association is the national trade association of solar energy manufacturers, dealers, distributors, contractors, installers, architects, consultants and marketers. Established in 1974, SEIA works to expand the use of solar technologies in the global marketplace, strengthen research and development, remove market barrier, and improve education and outreach for solar. www.seia.org

Contacts:
A&R Edelman
James Cortese, 650-762-2813
jcortese@ar-edelman.com
or
SEPA
Josephine Mooney, 202-857-0898 ext. 6
jmooney@solarelectricpower.org
or
SEIA
Monique Hanis, 202-682-0556 ext. 4
mhanis@seia.org

Please join our group:

http://push.pickensplan.com/group/greenjobsnow

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