A Saturday Afternoon with "We Care Solar"

A generous donation, from LWHS Parent Brad Rock, has connected the Lick/Drew Senegal Trip with the Berkeley-based NGO, We Care Solar.  On Saturday afternoon students learned about the solar suitcase's lighting and charging abilities, as well as how to install the units and properly train local health workers.  We'll be installing 3 of these units on the upcoming trip! 

Trying out the LED lights.  Very bright at only about 2 watts each.

Installation exercise.

Hal Aronson and Laura Stachel have an amazingly well designed and engineered system.  It's very exciting to make this connection and to be able to work with such a high quality device. Find out more about We Care Solar.  We'll post updates on the installation from the field.  Look for them on the LWHS/Drew trip blog.

Bill Kipp talks about the Challenges of Energy Transmission in the Southwest

Two weeks ago Bill Kipp talked to the Sustainable Energy class about the administrative, environmental, and political challenges of building new transmission lines to deliver sustainable energy to the various states in the Southwest.  His project, now 4 years in, will deliver wind and solar energy over thousands of miles at a cost less than that of a public utility company. Getting permission to cross lands owned by sovereign Native American nations, Military testing sites, wildlife preserves, and protected national monuments isn't as easy as you might think (nor should it be!). Check out the details here: http://www.southlinetransmissionproject.com/index.html