If you are involved in Management or Customer Service and are responsible for communicating the value of smart meters to your utility customers, you don’t want to miss this online discussion - Communicating Smart Meter Value. more...
Join social media mavens Matthew Burks and Amanda Shewmake as they provide an insider's perspective on how HR, communications and marketing professionals in energy companies can harness the power of social media to be more effective and productive. more...
The convergence of power and information technologies in the smart grid has created opportunities for finer grained and broader controls of energy flows. These opportunities can improve electric service in multiple dimensions: lower cost, greater reliability, greater customer satisfaction, and more...
Significant cost over runs. Changing business requirements. A well thought out plan is essential. Attend this free webcast discussion to hear inside hear three experts in utility operations discuss what utilities need to evaluate when they are considering upgrading or more...
The smart grid is shifting the playing field for utilities. And when the game changes, it pays to be prepared. A nimble solutions partner can help you design the solutions that keep operations on track, even as new challenges come more...
Deliver a profitable, productive and commercially successful large scale CSP business in India. Building on the success of past events in USA, Europe & MENA, CSP Today brings to New Delhi the most relevant international experience for the concentrated solar more...
Two day conference that tackles the most important challenges. A blend of European knowledge from the companies who have been installing offshore wind turbines for the last decade alongside local state governing bodies and leading project developers. Permitting, securing long more...
Autovation 2010 is a not-to-miss educational forum that will attract utility executives from around the world looking for new ways to optimize their operations through automation technologies. more...
The North American convention provides a remarkable opportunity to play a part in guiding renewable energy policy for the 21st century. Attendees will create a resolution that, along with similar resolutions already drafted on four other continents, will help set more...
Hosted by the GridWise(R) Alliance and the U.S. Department of Energy, the GridWise Global Forum will convene thought leaders from the highest levels of government, business, NGOS, and academia from around the world to discuss the ultimate enabling potential of more...
Introduction to Natural Gas Trading & Hedging - This program provides a comprehensive understanding of the structures that underlie Natural Gas trading. Beyond Essentials: Option Applications in Energy - This course provides a solid practical and conceptual (non-quantitative) understanding of more...
Electric Business Understanding provides a comprehensive overview of the electric industry. Position yourself for career advancement by gaining a solid understanding of how the electric business works including key physical, market, and regulatory aspects and how market participants navigate this more...
Electric Market Dynamics offers participants an in-depth understanding of North American electric markets and how they function. Enhance your career by furthering your knowledge of market structures, pricing mechanisms, services offered in markets, and how various participants use the markets more...
Gas and Electric Business Understanding provides a comprehensive overview of the natural gas and electric industries. Position yourself for career success by gaining a solid understanding of how each business works, including key physical, market and regulatory aspects, as well more...
Roger Arnold is a systems architect and engineer, recently focusing on energy systems and controls. His consulting company, Silverthorn Engineering, is developing architectures and software for motion control using custom switched-reluctance actuators and motor-generators.
Mr. Arnold graduated from the Honors College at Michigan State University with a triple major in physics, math, and chemistry. He then worked for IBM’s Components Division in Poughkeepsie, N.Y. His budding career at IBM, however, was interrupted by the draft.
The Army at that time had no slots in which to fit a drafted semiconductor physicist, however junior. However, it was assumed that a college graduate working for IBM must be an expert on business and data processing. On that basis, he was assigned as a systems analyst for a U.S. Forces Support District in Germany. As a lowly PFC, he found himself writing operating procedures and overseeing a pool of higher ranking military programmers and operators. He acquired a reputation for tactful troubleshooting. After two accelerated promotions, he spent much of his second year on temporary duty assignments to other locations in Germany.
It was, altogether, about as painless as military service in the final year of the Viet Nam war could get. Nonetheless, rubbing shoulders with men badly scarred by what they had seen and done in combat left an impression that informs his politics to this day.
Upon release from the Army, he enrolled at the University of Colorado Graduate School to study computer science and work as a research assistant in computer architectures. After graduate school, he worked seven years for Boeing Aerospace as a Software Engineer. His assignments ranged from IR&D on serial data communication protocols to embedded operating systems and software tools development. He worked with designers from IBM Federal Systems to optimize microcode of the IBM 4-Pi CC2 computer developed for the NATO E3A (AWACS) project. As a junior member of the proposal team for the sale of NATO AWACS planes to Iran, he narrowly missed being in Iran when the Shah was overthrown.
Mr. Arnold left Boeing in 1982 to join a startup company in San Diego. The company developed compilers and runtime software for the Ada programming language. He designed an advanced global optimizer for the compiler and served as manager of code generator development for RISC architectures. When the company was acquired by a competitor, he left and took a position as manager of compiler development for a company in the Silicon Valley area.
Since moving to Silicon Valley, he has worked for a number of different companies, in positions that leverage his unusual breadth of knowledge in software, hardware, and device physics. He was a principal architect and co-designer of the TriCore microprocessor / DSP used by Infineon Technologies in its line of controller products for the automotive market. He holds a number of patents on key architecture features of TriCore, including its variable length pipeline for masking memory fetch latencies.
Mr. Arnold currently resides in Sunnyvale, California, along with his wife, teenage son, and two cats. He can be reached at (408) 737-8687, or e-mail to RArnold@SilverthornEngineering.com.
Articles
1.10.07
Renewable Energy: Coping with Variability Part 3: Energy Storage
Topic: Energy Storage Article Viewed 8853 Times;
84 comments In parts 1 and 2, we looked at supply management and load management as mechanisms for coping with the variability of renewable energy sources. In this final part, we look at possibilities for energy storage - the ultimate solution for the long term, once the burning of fossil fuels is no longer an option.
12.28.06
Renewable Energy: Coping with Variability Part 2: Load Management
Topic: Energy Storage Article Viewed 6885 Times;
26 comments In Part 1, we looked at supply management as a mechanism for coping with the variability of wind resources. In this part, we look at the other side of the equation, load management. What are the prospects for being able to use power "as available", and how will that capability affect the economics of renewable energy?
12.21.06
Renewable Energy: Coping with Variability Part 1: Supply Management
Topic: Wind Article Viewed 7282 Times;
33 comments One of the biggest issues with solar and wind power is their variability. They produce power "when they want to", and not necessarily when we would like them to. There are ways to cope with this variability, but each has some economic cost. In this three-part article, we review current options, and suggest likely developments for the near future.
9.1.05
Will GTL Nail the Coffin Lid on Cheap NG?
Topic: Fossil & Biomass Article Viewed 11301 Times;
27 comments President Bush has said that to achieve energy independence for the United States, we need to quickly build new receiving terminals for liquefied natural gas (LNG). The new terminals will enable us to import more natural gas to compensate for our own flagging production.
The Hydrogen Economy: An Objective Look Part 1: Hydrogen as Transport Fuel
Topic: Electric Vehicles Article Viewed 9010 Times;
39 comments The recent and apparently continuing surge in oil and gas prices has stimulated fresh interest in the hydrogen economy. But the concept is surprisingly controversial. "The hydrogen economy" encapsulates a vision of hydrogen as a superior successor to fossil fuels for serving the world's energy needs.
