The Technical Society had only two meetings in January 2011. There
was no meeting scheduled for January 3 for the New Year’s Day holiday. The January 10 meeting was cancelled due to inclement weather. David R. Dinse, PE, TVA was scheduled to speak on the topic “Campbell Creek Research Homes – The First Year” The meeting has been rescheduled for February 28, 2011. There was no meeting scheduled for January 17, Martin Luther King Day.
January 24 – Jonathan Overly, Executive Director, East Tennessee Clean Fuels Coalition. Gave a presentation titled “Creating Local Catalysts: Building Alternate Fuels Projects in East Tennessee” (PDH) The East Tennessee Clean Fuels Coalition (ETCleanFuels) was founded in February 2002 by Jonathan Overly with funding from the Tennessee Department of Economic and Community Development, Energy Division, and the University of Tennessee. ETCleanFuels is a nonprofit organization [501(c)3 corporation] that serves the entire eastern portion of the state of Tennessee and is a designated member of the [U.S. DOE “Clean Cities” Program][1]. Almost 90 coalitions like ETCleanFuels exist across the U.S. serving various sized areas from small cities to entire states.
The main focus of
ETCleanFuels is to get alternative fuels in use in East Tennessee and do three things:
- Reduce regional and national oil dependence,
- Improve air quality, and
- Help Tennessee’s economy.
January 31 – Lee. L. Riedinger, the newly appointed director for the Center for Interdisciplinary Research and Graduate Education at the University of Tennessee at Knoxville, gave a presentation entitled: “The new UT/ORNL PhD in Energy Science and Engineering”. The Center for Interdisciplinary Research and Graduate Education (CIRE) offers one of the first interdisciplinary PhD programs in energy science and engineering. This new
degree provides breadth while preserving the depth and rigor of a PhD program. CIRE brings together extensive and complementary resources at The University of Tennessee, Knoxville (UTK) and Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) to increase science, technology, engineering, and mathematics academic and research activities of national significance focused on energy-related science and engineering. Graduate students will join interdisciplinary research teams at ORNL and UTK, which will expose them to problem-oriented research and development, and encourage them to approach research problems from new directions. The program seems to have generated a lot of interest and many potential students have applied. The stipend for a graduate
student is $28,000 per year- a far cry from the past! Dr. Riedinger is very enthusiastic about the qualifications of the faculty members who will be involved with the new PhD program and he anticipates being able to attract very highly qualified graduate students.