Michigan is putting a spin on Capitol Hill for the Inauguration of President Elect Barack Obama Tuesday January 20, 2008. A Windspire™ installed on Capital Hill in Washington D.C. will be visible from the Presidential Inauguration of Barack Obama January 20, 2009.
The Windspire™ which will be visible from the Presidential Inauguration will showcase Michigan Made Products to the world.
This working Windspire™ has been on display at the botanical gardens in Washington since May 2008. This is a display that pays for itself! Not only does the Windspire™ attract interest from visitors from around the world, it also supplies power back to the grid in Washington D.C.!
Talk about a display that gives added value!!! This is truly
~ a Working Display~
(if only my kids would work for me as hard!)
In honor of the election and to show support for the promises made by this next administration, Michigan's lower penisula will commission the first Windspire in the Copemish, Michigan Monday, January 19, 2009 in Copemish, Michigan. The very first installation in Michigan was in St. Ignace, Michigan ~ the upper penisula ~ during 70 mph winds in December 2008.
Contractor Devon O'Shea installed the first Windspire in Michigan's UP and will also be commissioning the second tower, said the Windspire, "Took off so fast in those winds I jumped back!" Yes, we are making Devon work through the winter. Last week he was racing to trench and beat the frost lines that are moving down about an inch a day to get the electric buried! Even my cable guy didn't do that!!
The Windspire™, developed by Nevada based Mariah Power will be manufactured in Manistee, Michigan through a partnership with Mastech Technologies.
The Windspire™ on Capital Hill represents important progress for Michigan in the renewable energy field. The partnership between Mariah Power and Mastech being formed with the assistance of city, county and state of Michigan economic development groups is the teamwork that leads to success.
Mastech will be able to consolidate all manufacturing operations under one roof in Manistee, Michigan offering cost efficient production that is reflected in the price to the consumer. Operations are expected to bring 120 new “green” jobs to Manistee over the next three years.
This photo was take at the North American Auto Show at Cobo Hall in Detroit Michigan ~ going on through January 25, 2009 it shows a practical application for the Windspire™ in a not ~ to ~ distant future.
Applications such as these demonstrate the teamwork that the auto industry and the renewable energy industry will incorporate to resolve the problems we can not deny in our economy.
Michigan is full of skilled trade workers and manufacturers who can make so much possible...
The Windspire™ is a practical example of progress for the great State of Michigan!
The Windspire™ offers an aesthetically pleasing design. This 30 foot vertical structure is very quiet, maintenance free and is “plug in Play” making installation a breeze. The system in Copemish will be tied to the electric grid, sending power back to the local utility company and resulting in a credit on the business owner’s electric utility bill. The Windsprire™ is elible for new federal tax credits.
The Windspire™ installation will take place at "high" noon on Monday January 19, 2009 at Contractors Building Supply Headquarters in Copemish, Michigan. I will look forward to meeting you in person there!
The Windspire™ should be generating power around 1pm.
CBS is inviting public and press are welcome to attend the commissioning of the system in Copemish,MI.
For more information you may contact Devon O'Shea (until he gets on the jobsite!!! 888-378-3160) or you may contact me.
Mary T. Bigelow © Copyright 2009. All rights reserved.
Photos courtesy of Mariah Power
True to JaneAnne's educator spirit of challenging her students, the ECO~All~Stars' January 2009 Challenge has been a real stumper and caused me some grief!!!
I suspect I am not alone~ but I rise to the challenge....
I began by making a visit to the Build America website. The studies provided demonstrate there are at least 5 different building climates in the United States. Through Build America, a building technology program from the Department of Energy (DOE), best practices have been studied for each of these climates. In addition, the DOE has studied solar thermal and solar photovoltaics (PV) best practices. These best practice case studies were prepared with your tax dollars and are available to you, consumers, builders and developers at no cost from the DOE, you have already paid for them.
Then I turned to Brad Pitt's Making It Right Project. I am not privy to the LEED – H checklist submitted to USGBC for certifying the homes Mr. Pitt is building in New Orleans, but I suspect that many of the points for certification have been garnered from site specific building practices. I am not going to explain the whole point system here, that will make a series of articles for me in the future. In the meantime, you can research the information on the USGBC website.
What I would like to call attention to is that a large part of what makes a home sustainable comes from site specific design. This is a basic premise of the US Green Building Council and correlates with the mission to have a profound impact not only on our economy, health and productivity ~ but also
~on our natural environment~
Over 50% of the points of the minimum 45 for a LEED-H certification can be achieved by meeting the following site specific goals:
A goal of the LEED-H program is that homes are affordable.
Part of the equation to build homes affordable are energy efficiency and durability. If a homeowner cannot afford the utilites after they move into the home they purchased at whatever costs, even if they were given the home in exchange for sweat equity, the home is truly not affordable. This is the part of the equation most people miss.
Up front cost does not make a home affordable!
To demonstrate this first part of JaneAnne's Challenge:
•1) REVEAL HOW members of yourcommunity might benefit from sustainable (green) designs
Come learn about a real example from my community.
There are many examples of homes that have not registered for LEED certification but possibly could have met certification if they had gone through the process. One of these homes I am familiar with is in Muskegon, Michigan.
This Muskegon County Habitat for Humanity home is built in a high density neighborhood. It is close to schools and hospitals and is within walking distance of an existing transportation infrastructure. The lot size and orientation is such that the footprint of the home only had one possible orientation on the site. Thus, other design changes were made to give it the best possible passive solar design.
This Muskegon Habitat for Humanity Home sports sleek, low profile solar hot water panels. This will give the homeowners, with all their children, FREE hot water for bathing, dishes, laundry and other household needs.
This is not the only design feature that will bring affordability to the large family moving into this home.
The design incorporates insulated concrete forms for the foundation, features highly efficient windows, programmable thermostats, and low flow water fixtures. It is an attractive home. This was a major goal. Homeowners will take more pride in an attractive house.
The home and Muskegon County Habitat for Humanity truly deserve a blog dedicated (coming in February) to put a spotlight on this successful project!
I’m fairly certain, this home that was built within budget, did not have a $15,000 design budget. I will check with Mike McIntyre at Muskegon Habitat to verify that information.
I suspect quite the opposite is true, it was built with intelligence, building science and existing resources which add to the sustainability of the project.
A major contributor to project success is Integrated Team Work from all members from the beginning of the project. This home demonstrates the dedication Michigan and Habitat for Humanity has to affordable housing.
And for the EASY part of JaneAnne's Challenge?
•2) REVEAL HOW members of the Active Rain Community can demonstrate to Brad Pitt the benefit of making the designs from his New Orleans project available for a nominal price to Individuals, Eco-communities, and/or Builders and Developers. EX. The availability might raise enough money to sponsor the remaining 62 homes that Brad Pitt has left to do.
My Dad always says, KISS....Keep It Simple Sweetheart!
As for Brad Pitt’s designs? They probably wouldn’t be much help any Michigan communities – the designs on stilts would need to be modified for our building and energy codes which would again increase the cost. We build most of our homes with the foundations below ground, not above ground! Engineering would need to be done for snow loads on the roofs.There would also be other design considerations.
This would not be very sustainable in practice.
But may I suggest?
The International Builder’s Show is just getting started in Las Vegas. This event promises to bring 90,000+ industry professionals together. Some of those professionals may find value in owning one of Mr. Pitt’s designs, if just to showcase a piece of a celebrity project and to support a good cause. They would probably get a charitable tax deduction to boot!
The Make It Right Project has 62 more homes to build at a cost of 200K each. Simple math tells me the project needs $12.4M to be completed. If Mr. Pitt’s entourage gave his designs away at the builder’s show in exchange for a minimum $1000 donation each he would need to secure 12,400 donations to attain his goal. At 5K each, Pitt would only need to attain 2,480. Seems rather simple and achievable.
I suppose if Mr. Pitt flew me out and provided accomodations I could reschedule my week to go take care of this for him.
~or~
How about a better idea that is likely more sustainable and would bring MORE VALUE to New Orleans?
I don't have the counts but I assume there are somewhere "in the neighborhood" (pun intended) 200,000+ homes that need to be rebuilt in New Orleans. Mr. Pitt’s designs were created specifically for New Orleans. Why not team up and share those plans with other builders and developers in NEW ORLEANS for a nominal fee of $500 or $1000 with rights to build from the designer/architect.
Seems a pretty simple solution that will best serve the New Orleans community….
Good luck, Mr. Pitt, I hope you attain your goal!
Thank you JaneAnne, Stephanie and the ECO~All~Stars for the challenge!!!
Mary T. Bigelow © Copyright 2009. All rights reserved.
The venue? Washington DC
The focus? Green Jobs..and I'm not talking about the Presidential Inauguration, although I find the timing uncanny. Remember Joe the Plumber? Now he is...Joe the Solar Guy!!!
The Good Jobs, Green Jobs National Conference is scheduled for February 3 - 6, 2009.
The event promises "government decision-makers and elected officials will join labor, environmental and business advocates to forge and agenda and share ideas and strategies for a refashioned, green economy."
Many I talk to are skeptical about how many jobs can be created by this burgeoning industry we call "green." On the conference website, you will be able to download two very important reports. One is from the US Conference of Mayors, Current and Potential Green Jobs in the US. The other is a report out of the UN, Emerging Green Economy Could Create Tens of Millions of "Green Jobs." Personally, I have downloaded these for later reading. The report from the UN is several hundred pages!
There is a lot of hope that green jobs will be part of the answer to the economic woes that plague our country.
AND....Much Skepticism....
When we look at the small scale, two guys constructing a foundation for a small wind generator it seems, well, small scale.
It's hard to believe that this is going to get our country out of trouble.
Like the conference, let's focus on the jobs for a moment. Let's take just a quick walk through ~
Cliff Notes if you will ~
Just like the foundation on a building, site preparation is very important. It takes man hours to move that dirt around and get it right.
The crew of two we see has assembled different materials just for the foundation...various woods for the forms, rebar or rerod, a sonatube....these materials were all manufactured, transported and sold to the contractors. Commerce at it's finest. The man hours in assembling the foundation were also numerous.
Next comes our cement....(another fine Consumers Concrete job!)
Behind the scenes...permits from municipalities, foundation and electrical inspections, engineering designs....
All this before the first blade on the wind generator turns......
There are also manufacturing jobs to create and assemble the materials...wire, tower, rotor, blades, inverter, and the list goes on...
Now, I want to try to make sense of this in numbers the average person can understand....
It is said that installation of one small wind energy system can provide a 40 hour work week, for one month, for one person. That is 160 hours into one installation. These numbers do not include the manufacturing process work hours.
A full time work week adds up to 2000 hours over a year. So if we extrapolate those numbers, 1000 small wind energy systems would provide 80 jobs for a year....
10,000 systems would provide 800 jobs for a year.
... not including manufacturing.
These numbers are still too small to have a major effect on the economy alone.
But just think of it!!! Extrapolate on your own. Isn't it exciting???
This example only focused on a very small but growing portion of the new green industry...
Small Wind Energy Systems....would 800 jobs help your community? your state?
I am in Michigan...we are losing that many jobs by the week. It has been said of Michigan,
"Last one out turn out the lights."
There are many in Michigan who will not leave, but will stay and keep the lights on with the new technologies in the market that will provide local jobs for local folks who will spend their money locally.
The end product is a beautiful example of independence...
what this country was founded on.
Let us once again declare independence...
I will be watching and listening to what comes out of the 2009 Good Jobs, Green Jobs National Conference.
I will also be watching and listening to you when you tell me,
What is going on in YOUR local area!
**photos: FCB Solar and Contractors Building Supply, Mary Bigelow Copyright 2009. All Rights Reserved.
COPYRIGHT © 2009 Mary McGraw-Bigelow All Rights Reserved
The Story of David and the Black Willow!!!
Tucked away in a very small community in northern Michigan, Copemish, is a very large project! A quaint little non-profit called the Champion Tree Project.
What is a champion tree? A champion tree is judged to be the largest of it's species.
So why a project? According to David Milarch, co-founder of the Champion Tree Project, the group was formed, "in 1996 in northern Michigan to essentially archive genetics and Arichival Living Libraries across the country and around the world of the last of the Old Growth Forest Genetics of Trees."
According to David, who was in the shade tree nursery business, they noticed that many of their stock was dying off and changing. Nursery stock that had always done well was not surviving. Through research they found that they were losing many species mainly to changes in the environment, "air and water quality, acid rain and new diseases. They began a quest for trees that had immune systems that were much stronger to take the climate change, take the attack from the air of acid rain and ozone pollution and be able to withstand the changing challenges that all trees are going through."
Have you ever heard a variety of willow tree called the Black Willow?
I hadn't until just recently.
What an interesting tree.
David Milarch is cloning a Champion Black Willow found smack dab in Traverse City, Michigan. This tree measures about 11 foot in diameter across the trunk.
So what is so great about this tree? Science has proven, according to Milarch, the Black Willows are a tree that extract mercuries, heavy metals, dioxins and the really bad stuff out of water and soil.
Can you imagine using the environment to clean the environment of all the stuff we have dumped into it?
Can you imagine a living organism that can actually survive on mercury?
I will be bringing you more information on the Champion Tree Project in coming months. In the meantime, you can follow this link to read an interview, from Turtle Creek Casino, with David Milarch. This interview gave the basic framework for my article.
Mr. Milarch and the Champion Tree Project is cloning THOUSANDS of trees with the tribe at Turtle Creek Casino in Manistee, Michigan to distribute to schools and environmental groups all over Northern Michigan...and throughout the world.
To what end? Remediation of rivers, streams, lakes and watersheds, naturally. Is that really important in Michigan?
YES! Michigan is surrounded by the Great Lakes which contain about 84 percent of North America's surface fresh water and about 21 percent of the world's supply. Yes. This is very important.
To steal from Paul Harvey...stay tuned for "the rest of the story!"
Looking up Mariah WindSpire!!!
Last month I spoke of a new manufacturing venture between MasTech Manufacturing and Mariah Wind Power and the possibility of the partnership bringing jobs to Manistee County in my blog Windspire by Mariah Power Part I.
Many in Michigan, including myself, have been sitting on pins and needles to hear the decision of this joint venture.
Where will the new home for the manufacturing of this Vertical Axis Wind Turbine be?
This began quietly in early June 2008. While working on the Michigan Energy Fair Allan O'Shea, co-chair of the Michigan Energy Fair and Chair of the Manistee County Commission received a lead that this company called Mariah Power was looking for a permanent home to manufacture the Windspire VAWT.
Since June 2008 the both the city and county of Manistee, the state of Michigan and private venture capitalists have come together to make it possible.
I received the joyous news today from Allan O'Shea. In a meeting of the Mariah board Monday September 15 locating manufacturing operations in Manistee Michigan was approved contingent on the passing of a $400,000 Community Development Block Grant (CBDG). The Manistee County Board of Commissioners approved the Community Block Devevelopment Grant at the regular commission meeting Tuesday morning.
Mr. O'Shea was very excited in our conversation today. He stressed the lengths that Michigan communities will go to in order to bring jobs to Michigan and to create a win-win situation for businesses. Renee Ihlenfeldt, Executive Director of the Alliance for Economic Success in Manistee has said that Mariah was very pleased with the way the community backed this project.
"They're extremely pleased with what they see talent-wise at MasTech," Ihlenfeldt said. "They know the product, the marketing and the engineering." Renee has been very instrumental in putting together the team that has worked with Mariah and MasTech. O'Shea credits Renee with "taking the ball and running with it."
Mariah currently has backorders for 3500 WindSpires, a year of work for the new partnership. The 30-foot tall wind energy system offers an alternative for urban residences and businesses. It is attractive and quiet and offers easy installation with minimal maintenence.
The WindSpire was one of the highlights at the Michigan Energy Fair this year. It was spinning all weekend long!!! If you are in Washington you can see the WindSpire on display at Capitol Hill!! Windspire is on display near the Capitol Building at the US Botanic Gardens through October 2008!
You can check in with Mike Brennan over at MITECHNEWS to hear a podcast recorded at the Michigan Energy Fair discussing the Mariah WindSpire.
Congrats Manistee and Michigan for bringing a projected 116 new jobs and tremendous technology to this community and this state! Bookmark my blog for new information on the WindSpire as manufacturing operations gear up!!!
PS...check out the solar tax credit expiration counter to the right...your 30% federal tax credit on Solar expires in less than 106 days!
COPYRIGHT © 2008 Mary McGraw-Bigelow All Rights Reserved
Photocredits: Mariah Wind Power
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