Weekend Fun
Musings from the GridWise Architectural Council, Orlando, 2010
After a week at the AHR show, and meeting with ASHRAE, and sitting in on B2G (Building to Grid) summit, I was back in the building zone as I sat in on day one of the GWAC meeting. The GridWise Architectural Council (GWAC) is a voluntary organization of people concerned with the future of energy. The Department of Energy sponsors meetings of the GWAC, a commitment that keeps the group in meeting rooms, coffee, and pastry...
Maybe the ongoing attempt to over-domesticate males is a barrier to sustainable energy. Maybe Swedish feminists are simply insensitive to carbon issues. Maybe Gaia just needs a man about the house. Maybe the essential appliance needed for the net zero energy (NZE) house is a urinal.
A report last week from Ohio University describes a catalyst capable of extracting hydrogen from urine. More efficient generation of hydrogen would be a great step to more effective energy storage, one without the major shortcomings of...
It's been a sparse week, but I am working on some talks, and doing a lot of work at my day job on BIM as a service model. There is something quite powerfull in this realm that I have not been able to define yet - not even enough to write about.
BIM as a service framework. BIM in the clouds. Transactional BIM running through service markets. Open Geospatial COnsortium (OGC) tagged Demand/Response in localize energy day trading.
It is snowing here in Carolina, but I will be up early to put my daughter on a plane to NYC. North Carolina does not handle ice well. I am expecting a complete mess on the way to the airport tomorrow morning.
A few hours later, I get on the plane to the city myself, to speak at AHR in the Javits center. As the biggest trde show for AirConditioning, Heating, and Refrigeration, there is alwauys a cluster of meetings and events nearby.
January 21, 2008 B2G (Building two Grid) summit - "New Business Models in Service Oriented Energy Management"
January 22, 2008 Global Warming and GridWise 10:30 at the Javits Convention Center
January 23, 2008 Preparing Buildings for a Sustainable World 1:30 PM Javits Convention Center
In between, I will try to squeeze in some time at the Commercial Building Initiative (CBI) to see the latest efforts to meet the 2030 challenge of zero net energy buildings.
Come by and see me if you're in town.
I live in an shuttered mill town; the mill closed nearly 40 years ago. Many of the places my children explored while growing up were forbidden relics. They would creep up the rotting stairs of the county’s first cinema, no bigger than many home theatres, to view the still-open projectionist’s log. They would hunt snakes and crawfish under the old general store. They even made excursions into the old mill itself, until it burned sown in a succession of surprisingly large fires. Those fires were probably the dire consequence f misguided environmental policy—of which I may write on another day.
There is another old relic at the heart of town, one that the state and its rational engineers tried to destroy: the old bridge. The old bridge was built in the 20’s, when Bynum was the end of the paved road. A cement roadbed still extrudes from the north end of the bridge up to the second general store where it ends in blacktop.
When 15-501 was paved, it swerved to miss the town, crossing the Haw River just upstream. Some old timers claim they avoided the town so folks could drive from Chapel Hill to Pittsboro without being shot at. That was a lucky break, because it preserved a quiet community and the one lane bridge crossing the river by the old mill.
When the State was planning to make 15-501 a divided highway, they first scheduled the old bridge for destruction. Tear it down, make it bigger, and folks can drive through the town during the highway construction. This, of course, would years later still encourage impatient folk to speed through town to get past a slow school bus on the highway. The free-ranging flash crowds of dogs that characterize Bynum would have been quickly culled. So the unincorporated town protested, eventually successfully
In a fit of petulance, the State next announced that they would tear the old bridge town, cutting the town in two. Not up to standards. One lane bridges are outmoded—you might have to wait on one end for the other driver to cross. Finally, after more protest, the State relented, but still insisted on blocking each end to prevent traffic crossing.
In central Carolina, there is a tradition of placing jack-o-lanterns on country bridges at Halloween. Higher speeds on newer roads have made that dangerous. New designs offer no ledge to place the pumpkins on. But the old Bynum Bridge, with its squared off concrete sides, can still hold and display the giant squash. Now blocked off, a virtual 1/8th of a mile walking plaza, the old bridge has become Pumpkin Display Gallery for the whole county.
Last night there must have been 80 or so carved vegetables. A few were traditional, albeit better than I ever manage. Others offered radical designs, or were carved with linoleum cutters, and awls, and who knows what to produce translucent cave drawings, and demonologies, and even nature scenes. Some were influenced by Bosch, or Durer, or the rock painting of the Anastasi, or the folk art of the Mexican Day of the Dead. There was even a small can of pumpkin pie filling with a votive candle in front.
Later in the evening, two nameless individuals began drumming at the end of the bridge. There were wearing costumes with a line of glow-sticks sewn down each limb, making a read stick figure, and a blue stick figure that danced, and drummed, in the dark. When their performance was over, they vanished into the dark. Their performance made a fine end to the evening.
It was a triumph of local good will and creativity over the single purpose engineering of the Department of Transportation. Halloween evening was just one other experience of what makes Bynum a special place to live and raise a family.