Proceedings Of The 6th National Passive Solar Conference September 8 12 1981 Portland Oregon

Energy Developments: New Forms, Renewables, Conservation is a collection of papers that discusses alternative energy sources. In discussing these energy sources, the text considers factors such as technical, economic, and human dimensions. The first part of the text presents articles that cover forms of energy, such as the feasibility of coal gasification and electric power from salinity gradients by reverse electrodialysis. Next, the book reviews materials about renewable forms of energy that include genetically improved hardwoods as a potential energy source and heat pump investigations for northern climate applications. In the last part, the text provides studies that deal with energy conservation, such as shared savings financing for energy efficiency and consumer information, and government energy conservation incentive programs. The book will be of use to scientists, engineers, and technicians involved in the research, development, and implementation of alternative energy technology.

Describes developments in passive solar technology that will save time, energy, and resources in planning for the buildings of the future.This companion to Passive Cooling and Solar Building Architecture (volumes 8 and 9) describes developments in passive solar technology that will save time, energy, and resources in planning for the buildings of the future. It is filled with tips and useful research for architects and designers and includes three substantial chapters on general modeling. Passive solar heating works. Properly designed and constructed, it is cost-effective, practical, comfortable, and aesthetic. Balcomb's introductory remarks set the tone for the rest of the contributions, which describe the considerable record of achievements in passive solar heating. Balcomb summarizes and evaluates the era between 1976 and 1983 when most of the major developments took place and highlights the design features that have contributed to effective buildings. Three chapters cover modeling passive systems (applicable to both heating and cooling), and six chapters focus on the application of passive solar heating, with emphasis on components, analytical results for specific systems, test modules, subsystem integration into buildings, performance monitoring and results, and design tools.J. Douglas Balcomb is a Principal Engineer with the Solar Energy Research Institute.

The field of solar energy conversion has become an important discipline with a recognized potential to significantly contribute to the world supply of energy. It is diversified and encompasses a wide variety of disciplines - from mechanical engineering to physics, from biology to architecture, from ocean science to agriculture, from chemistry to atmospheric science, to name some of the major fields. It involves fields which have matured to the engineering aspects, such as the conversion of solar energy into heat or of wind into shaft work. It includes other fields in which more basic science research is necessary to unravel the micro-structures of nature, as, for example, for photovoltaic conversion or for certain bioengineering tasks. Several of these fields have elements which have been common knowledge for centuries but sometimes forgotten at times of cheap energy supplies, while others have barely started with first studies. Most of the fields have seen during the last decade a substantial advance in sophistication, in theoretical understanding, in demonstrated feasibility, in developing hardware, in field testing, with some moving into a phase of initial commercialization.