Hayward Street Geothermal Cooling $20M

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Hayward Street Geothermal Cooling $20M

August 21, 2024
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ACTION REQUEST: $20M

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Geothermal cooling plants have far fewer moving parts and thus pay for themselves by combining immediate energy savings, revenue from excess energy or services, government incentives, and long-term operational efficiency. “Classical” payback period depends on factors like the plant’s scale and available incentives through DTE Energy.

1. Energy Cost Savings

  • Reduced Operating Costs: Geothermal systems use the relatively constant temperature of the earth to provide heating and cooling, which can be much more energy-efficient than traditional HVAC systems. This efficiency leads to lower utility bills for the facility, resulting in significant cost savings over time.
  • Lower Maintenance Costs: Geothermal systems generally have fewer moving parts than conventional systems, leading to lower maintenance and repair costs.

2. Revenue Generation

  • Selling Excess Energy: In some cases, geothermal plants can produce more energy than needed for cooling. This excess energy can be sold back to the grid or used for other purposes, providing an additional revenue stream.
  • Leasing and Service Agreements: Some facilities enter into agreements with nearby buildings or industries to provide geothermal cooling services, generating income.

3. Government Incentives and Subsidies

  • Tax Credits and Rebates: Many governments offer financial incentives, such as tax credits, grants, and rebates, for the installation and operation of geothermal systems. These incentives can significantly reduce the upfront costs and improve the payback period.
  • Renewable Energy Certificates(RECs): In some regions, geothermal plants can earn RECs for generating renewable energy. These certificates can be sold to other companies to offset their carbon emissions, generating additional income.

4. Environmental and Social Benefits

  • Carbon Credits: By reducing greenhouse gas emissions compared to traditional systems, geothermal plants can earn carbon credits, which can be sold or traded in carbon markets.
  • Sustainability Branding: Businesses that use geothermal cooling can market themselves as environmentally friendly, potentially attracting more customers or tenants, which indirectly supports the plant’s financial viability.

5. Long-Term Investment

  • Long Lifespan: Geothermal systems typically have a long lifespan (20-50 years), allowing for a long-term return on investment. While the initial capital costs are high, the system’s durability and low operating costs contribute to a favorable payback over time.
  • Resilience Against Energy Price Volatility: Geothermal systems provide protection against fluctuating energy prices, offering stable and predictable costs, which is financially beneficial over the long term.

6. Financing Models

  • Power Purchase Agreements (PPAs): Some geothermal plants are financed through PPAs, where a third party finances the installation and the facility pays for the energy produced, typically at a lower rate than conventional energy sources.
  • Energy Service Companies (ESCOs): These companies can finance, install, and maintain geothermal systems, with the facility paying for the service over time, usually based on the energy savings achieved.

7. Scalability and Integration

  • Integration with Other Renewable Systems: Geothermal cooling can be part of a broader renewable energy strategy, integrating with solar or wind power to further enhance efficiency and reduce costs, improving the overall financial outlook.

Earth Energy Systems

Marina & Boatyard Electrical Safety

August 20, 2024
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Rowing at the 2024 Summer Olympics

“The Biglin Brothers Racing| Thomas Eakins (1872)

Rowing competition in the 2024 Olympics inspires a  revisit of NFPA 303: Fire Protection Standard for Marinas and Boatyards.  Apart from athletic competition, many colleges, universities and trade schools with academic programs are responsible for safety of facilities located on fresh and saltwater shorelines.  Other nations refer to best practice discovered and applied in the United States.   Keep in mind that, unlike other nations, the standard of care for electrical safety in the United States is driven primarily by the fire safety community.   This happens because public safety leadership falls upon the local Fire Marshall who has a budget that is widely understand and generally supported.

From the NFPA 303 scope statement:

 This standard applies to the construction and operation of marinas, boatyards, yacht clubs, boat condominiums, docking facilities associated with residential condominiums, multiple-docking facilities at multiple-family residences, and all associated piers, docks, and floats.

This standard also applies to support facilities and structures used for construction, repair, storage, hauling and launching, or fueling of vessels if fire on a pier would pose an immediate threat to these facilities, or if a fire at a referenced facility would pose an immediate threat to a docking facility.

This standard applies to marinas and facilities servicing small recreational and commercial craft, yachts, and other craft of not more than 300 gross tons.

This standard is not intended to apply to a private, noncommercial docking facility constructed or occupied for the use of the owners or residents of the associated single-family dwelling.

No requirement in this standard is to be construed as reducing applicable building, fire, and electrical codes.

The standard of care for facilities owned by educational institutions is not appreciably different from the standard of care for any other Owner except some consideration should be given to the age and training of most of the occupants — students, of course — who are a generally transient population.  Some research projects undertaken on university-owned facilities are also subject to the local adaptions of NFPA 303.  The current version of NFPA 303 is linked below:

FREE ACCESS: NFPA 303

 

Boathouse Row / Philadelphia

The 2021 Edition is the current edition and the next edition will be the 2025 revision.  Click on the link below to read what new ideas were running through the current edition; mostly electrical that are intended to correlate with National Electrical Code Article 555 and recent electrical safety research*:

NFPA 303 Public Input Report for the 2021 Edition

Public input closing date for the 2025 Edition is June 1, 2023.   

You may submit comment directly to NFPA on this and/or any other NFPA consensus product by CLICKING HERE.  You will need to set up a (free) account.   NFPA 303 document is also on the standing agenda of our 4 times monthly collaboration with the IEEE Education & Healthcare Facilities Committee.  See our CALENDAR for the next online colloquium; open to everyone.

Michigan Technological University

Issue: [16-133]

Category: Electrical, #SmartCampus, Facility Asset Management

Colleagues: Mike Anthony,  Jim Harvey


LEARN MORE:

* Marina Risk Reduction

NFPA 70 National Electrical Code (Article 555)

Examining the Risk of Electric Shock Drowning (ESD) As a Function of Water Conductivity

Apricot Galettes

August 19, 2024
mike@standardsmichigan.com

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How to Make the Three Most Popular Milk Coffees

August 19, 2024
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Coffs Harbour

Cowardice Is Killing The West

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Engineering a Fair Future: Why we need to train unbiased AI

August 16, 2024
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OpenAI was founded in 2015 by a group of technology luminaries, including Elon Musk, Sam Altman, Greg Brockman, Ilya Sutskever, John Schulman, and Wojciech Zaremba. The organization was created with the goal of developing advanced artificial intelligence technologies in a way that is safe and beneficial for humanity.  It is written in multiple programming languages, but the primary language used to build the model is Python but relies on a range of other software tools and frameworks, including TensorFlow and PyTorch for training and deploying the deep learning models, and various libraries for data preprocessing and postprocessing, such as spaCy, NLTK, and Transformers.

Since its founding, OpenAI has grown to become one of the world’s leading AI research organizations, with a team of hundreds of researchers and engineers working on a wide range of projects in areas such as natural language processing, robotics, computer vision, and more.  Much like humans, ChatGPT will likely struggle negotiating “bias”.  As of this posting it seems clear that the algorithm produces answers that are biased toward large central government; most likely the result of not having enough historical input about how a smaller central government is largely responsible for inventing it.

Software Engineering Ethics Education

print(“Python”)

Manifesto for Software Development

Haystack Observatory

August 16, 2024
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The Haystack Observatory is a research facility primarily focused on radio astronomy, geodesy, and atmospheric science research.  Although WMBR and the Haystack Observatory are both associated with MIT, they serve distinct purposes; with WMBR focuses on providing a platform for student radio programming and community engagement in the Cambridge region.

 

 

The transmitter for student-run radio station, WMBR 88.1 FM, is located in the town of Belmont about 3 miles from campus; situated on a tower at 150 Pleasant Street in Belmont. This location allows WMBR’s signal to cover a significant portion of the greater Boston area, reaching listeners in Cambridge, Boston, and surrounding communities.

Stadio dei Marmi

August 15, 2024
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