by psvish
1. October 2010 03:40
As we start the last quarter of this year, seems like a good time to share some updates with our readers:
- We have added an Industry News section to the V-TECH web site - in this new section, we will be providing a carefully selected news items relevant to the DSM area. Typical items would include news about utility filings, Commission rulings/actions, legislative actions on DSM programs, renewable energy standards or portfolio energy credits, news about product/technology introductions, and updates on utility program performance.
- I am off to Portland, OR next week for the AESP Fall conference and will be there between October 4 - 6. I will have an update from the conference and look forward to renewing old friendships [not to name names, but some of you know what I mean when I say "old"!] and forming new ones.
In other matters, there was an interesting
ABC News item on TV this week in the category: apparently, energy efficient windows could morph into deadly laser shooting devices. The report covers what happened at the newly construction Vidara Hotel in Las Vegas which has the state-of-the-art coated window panes. When the afternoon sun hits the panes, it concentrates the rays and shoots them down into the pool area burning guests and melting plastic cups! It also reports on similar situations in other states where concentrated reflections from EE windows are melting vinyl sidings off neighbor's homes.
[Photo courtesy of ABC News site]
A related article discusses the Las Vegas situation in further detail and claims that the hotel has known about the problem from 2008 and hasn't fixed the problem as of today. It seems to us that as new technologies are introduced, one can expect to run into unexpected situations like these in the future. In this case, the problem here is caused by a combination of the building orientation, nature of the coating on the window pane, the curvature of the window pane which acts to concentrate the sun's heat and how hot it gets where the hotel is situated [in this case, Las Vegas where temperatures routinely exceed 100F in summer].
Track. Report. Analyze. Manage.
