Appalachian Institute for Renewable Energy
Pioneering community-owned renewable energy
This blog posted was cross posted from Appalachian Voices Front Porch Blog. Research and reporting by Appalachian Voices’ Dr. Matthew Wasson. As Congress was returning from the August recess, there wasn’t much news about the climate bill. The only energy-related news breaking through the coverage of the rancorous health care debates and town-hall tea parties
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Contact: Jessica Hocz Wind Power Educational Forum Scheduled Mountain Valleys RC&D 10-22-2009 Alternative Energy Manager 828-649-3313, ext.5 Mountain Valleys Resource Conservation & Development, Blue Ridge Resource Conservation & Development, Toe River Valley Watch and the UNCA Environmental Center are sponsoring ‘Wind Power Educational Forums’ on November 11th in Asheville at UNCA’s Owen
The cities are part of an 11-city consortium called the Minnesota Municipal Power Agency (MMPA) that is trying to meet the state’s progressive renewable energy mandates. All 11 cities are erecting recycled windmills that should be generating electricity by year’s end…. Read the story here… //www.startribune.com/local/west/64710607.html?elr=KArks:DCiUHc3E7_V_nDaycUiD3aPc:_Yyc:aUUr
RALEIGH – The N.C. Senate voted today to ban the commercial generation of wind energy in mountain counties. Supporters of the ban argued that the construction of large wind turbines on mountain ridges would ruin the natural beauty of the mountains. Environmentalists say that the state should be encouraging wind power, not limiting it. Read
It’s been a while but AIRE’s community solar demonstration is finally producing electricity and reducing Boone’s carbon footprint. Here’s a brief update and look ahead to some next steps. Keep in mind the purpose of our first project was to illuminate the barriers to community-based renewable energy, and then create solutions to those barriers. Here’s
The raging wind policy war in North Carolina exposes a vast gulf in understanding, and in limited cases, the inability to carry on a civil discourse to explore difference. This has a polarizing effect on the discourse and creates a blind spot for the third way– “distributed generation” or community-based renewable energy. Certainly some favor
In the volatile debate on wind power permitting in North Carolina (SB1068), it seems that the only versions of the story being told are utility-scale wind farms and anti-wind. In other words, it’s a polarized, “all or nothing” framing of the issue as shaped by the media and the over-simplified public rhetoric. Here’s a closer
The Southern Appalachian region contains abundant and readily available wind, solar, and microhydro resources for producing home-grown, clean, and renewable energy. The Western North Carolina Renewable Energy Initiative (WNCREI) is an Appalachian State University Energy Center (ASUEC) project dedicated to helping create a sustainable energy future for our region. The WNCREI is proud to host