Green Options » Harvard

YOUR Beer with Obama

Joe Walsh — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 22:03:34 +0000

Unless you spent last week celebrating Apollo 11’s fortieth anniversary cut off from the world in your backyard model of the lunar module, you are no doubt familiar with the story of Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates Jr.’s arrest two weeks ago, the “race in America” sturm and drang that surrounded the story last week, and the headline-grabbing role President Obama stumbled into at the end of his prime time presser.

An “American” story of race and class, the arrest and aftermath narrative now seems to have settled comfortably into a hackneyed old gender stereotype; namely, that there is no better way for three “guys” to sort things out than over a beer. We know what the chatter will be about, and Cambridge’s local reports that it will be conducted over Blue Moon if Sergeant Crowley does the choosing, which leads me to ask:

What’s on the agenda for your beer with Obama?

I’ll post my top three items below, but I’m most interested in your comments. You can tell me what you would be drinking if you like, but I’m more interested in your talking points. What are the two or three key messages you would deliver to the White House on energy and environmental policy?

New Fuel Economy Standards are Not Counterproductive

Nick Chambers — Thu, 21 May 2009 16:19:19 +0000

Listening to NPR’s Morning Edition yesterday, there was a segment in which some environmentalists lamented Obama’s new fuel economy standards as being a small drop in the bucket for what needs to be done to solve our climate problems.

While this is true, two comments made by Harvard University Professor, Robert Stavins, during that segment struck me as weird and based in something less than reality — a kind of academic fantasy if you will. At the time, I was driving and the comments slid out of my mind. But last night an old friend from college brought it up again in a Facebook thread and it got me thinking more in depth about it.

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Biofuels Researcher Moves Closer to Creating Artificial Life

Nick Chambers — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 22:08:24 +0000

A well-known biofuels researcher at Harvard has developed a synthetic ribosome — one of the fundamental building blocks for creating artificial life — which, initially, could have major implications for the creation of designer enzymes to make cheaper and more energy efficient cellulosic ethanol.

Dr. George Church, co-founder of the next generation biofuels company LS9, made the stunning announcement in a telephone call with reporters.

“If you are going to make synthetic life that is anything like current life … you have got to have this … biological machine,” Dr. Church said in comments to Reuters.

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Synthetic Life A Step Closer Due to Harvard Scientists

Jake Richardson — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 19:33:34 +0000

Two Harvard researchers say they have successfully constructed a ribosome.

Harvard Medical School Professor Greg Church and Research Fellow Michael Jewett extracted ribosomes from E. coli bacteria, processed them, and then made new ones from the molecules.

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ZapRoot: Google Causes Global Warming?

Jeff McIntire-Strasburg — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 19:29:08 +0000

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This week at ZapRoot: Is Google destroying the planet one search at a time? The recycling market has gone bust. And check out “That’s Just Weird.”

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IBM, Harvard Use Distributed Computing to Make Ultra-Powerful Solar Cells

Ariel Schwartz — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 18:02:27 +0000

Researchers at IBM and Harvard are using the power of community to create cheap, efficient solar cells. The Clean Energy Project will use small amounts of computing power from volunteers— like in the SETI project— to run calculations on compounds in the hopes of finding a combination of organic materials that can be used to make cheap, flexible plastic solar cells.

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GE Ends Development of Incandescent Bulbs, Focuses on LEDs

Jerry James Stone — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 01:55:33 +0000

According to Clean Break, General Electric has dumped all plans for revitalizing their century-old incandescent lightbulb. Instead, it plans to focus on light-emitting diodes (LED) and its organic counterpart — the OLED.

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Harvard Offers Students Sustainable LEED Certified Dorms

Jerry James Stone — Sun, 09 Nov 2008 19:13:51 +0000

In keeping with Harvard’s university-wide commitment to sustainable building practices and campus operations, the university has just completed graduate housing that is set to achieve a high level of LEED certification. The 115,000 sq ft project houses 215 beds in over 30 different suite types, and includes a faculty director’s suite, a fitness room, study lounge spaces, a multipurpose room, and a garage that extends under the building.

The swanky housing is packed with renewable bamboo flooring, considered wall paneling, low VOC finishes, and regionally sourced siding with recycled content. It was also designed and engineered to minimize energy usage.

The housing was designed by architect Kyu Sung Woo, who recently won Korea’s version of the Nobel Prize - the Ho-Am Prize.

Source: worldarchitecturenews.com

‘Black Silicon’ Could Revolutionize Solar Cell Technology

Andrew Williams — Sun, 12 Oct 2008 21:17:36 +0000

A newly discovered material called ‘black silicon’ is between 100 and 500 times more sensitive to light than conventional silicon, and could be used to revolutionize solar energy generation.

The material was discovered when a team of Harvard University scientists shone an ultra-powerful laser (briefly producing the same amount of energy as the sun falling on the entire surface of the Earth) on a silicon wafer, before adding sulphur hexafluoride. The result was a silicon wafer that looked black to the naked eye, but when examined under an electron microscope turned out to be covered with a massive amount of ultra-tiny spikes.

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Platinum LEED 19th Century Building

Philip Proefrock — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 04:50:52 +0000

Harvard University has achieved several firsts with the recent renovation of an old power plant into an office building. It is the first LEED Platinum certified university building renovation, as well as Harvard’s first Platinum building. More interestingly though, it is the first Platinum building built before the turn of the the century–last century, that is. Further, the university was able to complete this building without an increase in the up-front construction costs.

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