For centuries, the energy marketplace has been focused on:
- Centralizing power structures (large-scale power generation, financial controls);
- Exponential growth in the demand for electricity and extractive additives (think fertilizer and concrete, for example);
- Burning the btus of petroleum products, and
- Socializing all the “externalities” including the real costs of public health, ecosystem resilience, indigenous governance structures, global climate stability, and so on.
To address these issues, SEEDS facilitated a salon series to elevate regional energy literacy, strengthen the platform for Clean Energy penetration into our regional marketplace, create quality time for problem solvers who are ‘doing the work’, and identify useful tools and information that can be more broadly shared.
To take full advantage of the multitude of multi-sector opportunities available, we believe this corner of Michigan can – and perhaps must – play a key role in the global transition to clean energy. Our way of life is literally at stake, a transition to clean habits is overdue, necessary, and imminent. Can we shift the balance on business-as-usual toward infrastructure that takes advantage of opportunities for stacked benefits – especially including quality of life? Will we choose quality of life for the 7th generation over the convenience of last year’s solutions?
Topic: Electric Vehicle Deployment
Question: “How can our region become the model for Rural Electric Vehicle deployment?”
Electric Vehicle Salon Summary
- The Drive: Internal Combustion Vehicle Sales Likely Peaked in 2018
- RethinkX Transportation Report
- The Interchange: Utilities vs Oil Majors vs Mobility Providers vs Big Tech
- Fast Company: These Futureproof Parking Garages can be Easily Turned into Office or Housing
- RMI: EV Charging for Dummies
- VIDEO: Tony Seba, Stanford University: Transportation Disruption
- Interactive calculator for number of EV charging stations needed in a region
- Clean Energy States Alliance “EVs and the Electricity System” webinar slides and recording
- Consumers Energy approves 125 EV charging station rebates
- Why building owners should care about increasing EV adoption
- EVs aren’t the enemy of car culture
- As EVs evolve, automakers look beyond boring hatchbacks
- Electric vehicle charging infrastructure: current challenges and impacts on EV adoption in the U.S.
Topic: Serving Our Neighbors Through Investments
Question: “How will we serve our neighbors, our waters, and our local economy by our investments in clean energy?”
- Investments Salon Summary
- Worldbank: Energy
- How big is the energy efficiency resource?
- The biggest resource we don’t use
- IOPscience
- How much energy is consumed in US residential and commercial buildings?
- Message to COP21 Leaders: Need solutions? Ask Nature!
- 9 Biomimcry Solutions for Climate Change
- IMT Energy Opportunity Scan
- State Profile and Energy Estimates: Michigan
- National Association of Realtors: Energy Efficiency and Climate Change
Topic: Expansion Planning at Cherry Capital Airport
Question: “How can we make the next TVC terminal expansion define a new normal for energy conservation, efficiency, and renewable technology integration?”
Sponsored by Rotary Charities of Traverse City, Cherry Capital Airport, Grand Traverse Construction, and Traverse Area Association of Realtors
