• the 38^th National Passive Solar Energy Conference
• the 8^th ASES Policy and Marketing Conference, and
• the inaugural Young Professionals in Renewable Energy Conference.

The American Solar Energy Society invites participation from professionals with special knowledge in the solar, renewable or sustainability fields. Program selections are based solely on the merit of the abstract or proposal. Acceptance of abstracts or proposals for presentation is based on a review of submitted materials by the designated Solar 2013 review committee. Proposals may include technical papers (to be presented at the conference) as well as forum sessions.

 Technical paper presentations at the conference include:

• Oral presentations – Typically 10-20 minutes per paper presentation (length to be determined and included in acceptance information).
• Poster presentations – Presenters will create a poster to display and will have the opportunity to do a brief overview, followed by discussion.
• “Ignite” presentations – Each presenter has 5 minutes, 20 slides, 15 seconds per slide.

Forum sessions may include:

• Panel discussions organized on a specific topic.
• Demonstrations of technology or techniques.
• In-depth discussion or debates.
• “Shoot-outs” or comparisons of competing (or complementary) technologies.

These are the topical areas for Solar 2013:

Annual National Solar Conference

• Photovoltaics
• Concentrated Solar Power
• Solar Thermal
• Distributed Wind
• Resource Applications and Integration
• Sustainable Transportation
• Water and Energy Technologies
• Cross-Track, Multi-Technology, or Other

Passive Solar Conference

• Emerging Architecture & Passive Building Technologies
• Daylighting, Modeling and Building Automation

Solar and Renewable Policy & Finance Conference

• Finance & Industry Development
• Policy & Sustainability

 Young Professionals in Renewable Energy

The inaugural Young Professionals in Renewable Energy Conference will include sessions from other tracks at Solar 2013. If you would like your proposal to be considered for inclusion, please enter the appropriate information during the abstract submission process. Additional information will be available at solar2013.org.

Continuing Education Credits

Depending on topic, ASES may be able to offer professional continuing education credits for various technical sessions and forums.  Having a session approved for credit can potentially increase attendance and expose your presentation to interested conference attendees.  Presentations that qualify for CEUs will be grouped with other qualifying presentations to enable the entire session to offer credit. If your proposal meets the criteria and is accepted, additional information may be requested from you.

Important Information and Deadlines

• The deadline for submission is November 6, 2012.
• The review process is “blind” – author/submitter names are withheld during the review process.
• Please do not submit multiple formats (e.g., paper and forum) on the same research.
• You will have the opportunity to select your presentation-style preference
• Registration: the presenting author for accepted papers, as well as organizers of accepted forum proposals, must register by February 15, 2013 in order to secure the presentation in the schedule. Other registration information is included in the Terms and Conditions.

Photo Credit: Blue Forest UK

Building sustainably is very important in this day and age in order to help our environment as well as cut costs in the long term. New homes each day are being build more sustainable than the previous. Because of that, all types of new buildings should also incorporate sustainable methods that everyone from children to adults can enjoy. The world-renowned author of the famous Harry Potter Seriers, J.K. Rowling, designed a two-story, multiple building, sustainable treehouse with the company Blue Forest for her children in Edinburgh, Scotland. The treehouse structures look strikingly familiar, similar to the Hogwarts School of Wizardry. This massive treehouse features two-story high structures, balconies, turrets, trap doors, secret entrances, slides, and spiral staircases. Even though this structure is so massive, it is still being built sustainably because the company building the treehouse specializes in sustainable, eco-buildings. Blue forest builds sustainably in many different ways including solar water heating, composting toilets, and rainwater harvesting systems.

Photo Credit: Blue Forest UK

Source: Mather Nature Network: J.K. Rowling Planning Massive Backyard Treehouse

Folks in the gas industry claim they can provide cheap fuel here for a century. Factories that use a lot of heat (for making metals and glass, for instance) can now run more profitably in the United States than in countries with higher energy costs.

Natural gas pipeline in Switzerland. Energy-intensive factories can now operate more profitably in the U.S. than in countries with higher energy costs.

The implications for renewable-energy development in North America are vast, but not necessarily as ominous as some media reports would have it.

For context, consider that a million Btu (10 therms) has a theoretical heat value equivalent to 292 kilowatt-hours of electricity. But the world’s best combined-cycle heat-recovery gas turbine plants can hit 60-percent efficiency, and most existing plants run at 35 to 40 percent. On average, at $2.50, gas costs 2.1 cents per kilowatt-hour. That’s in the ballpark with coal.

The EPA says that compared to coal, natural gas produces half as much carbon dioxide, less than a third as much nitrogen oxides, and one percent as much sulphur oxides at the power plant. And so, faced with the costs of retrofitting a filthy old coal plant, it makes sense to turn it into a natural gas plant.

Sounds easy. But the utility business has the same problem the trucking companies do. They’d love to burn gas but it may not be readily available where they need it. The pipeline infrastructure doesn’t cover the country, and is expensive to install.

Greg Ebel, president of the gas-pipeline company Spectra, on March 4 told an audience at the Vail Global Energy Forum that he can cut the cost of natural gas in northern New Jersey and New York City by 75 percent, just by building a 16-mile pipeline. And 100 old coal plants lie close enough to his main routes to convert to gas.

But that’s 100 plants out of roughly 1500 coal-fired generating plants in the United States. In effect, natural gas faces some of the same transmission issues as utility-scale solar and wind power. And after the San Bruno explosion, new gas pipelines  ― even the renovation of old gas pipelines ― may face the same local resistance as any new above-ground high-voltage electric line.

Most important, those of us concerned about the future of the climate are aware that natural gas isn’t a solution to the carbon emissions problem. A report from the National Center for Atmospheric Research last fall pointed out that converting from coal to gas won’t be enough to halt or reverse global warming. Only carbon-free power sources can do that.

To learn more about the interface of renewable energy and natural gas, register today for the World Renewable Energy Forum in Denver, May 13-17.