Heat From Cold, Fuel from Food and Other Amazing Alternative Energy!

As I drove down to Seward on Monday enjoying one of those glorious Seward Highway drives that all too few Alaskans and even fewer tourists get to enjoy, I paused again to contemplate the amazing paradox of Arctic heat and cold.  It was chilly out (22F), but inside my car it was so toasty that I turned the heater off and rolled up my shirt sleeves!

Looking out over an ice covered Turnagain Arm, I was reminded of just how lucky we are in Seward to have an ice free bay on our doorstep.  I recalled my conversations back in early 2009 with our facilities team leads, Steve Carrick and Darryl Schaefermeyer and consulting engineer, Andy Baker about how we might begin to capture some of that energy.  That was ther genesis of the seawater heat pump project that we are now busily implementing and which will be a transformational emerging energy technology for South Central Alaska... oh, and did I mention the fuel it will save us?

Last week Andy and I were invited by the Alaska Energy Authority and the Alaska Center for Energy and Power to join five other emerging energy technology projects to share our initial experience with project implementation.  It was really informative to sit back and listen to renewable energy pioneers speak about their work.  In my mind, it was analagous to listening to the early farmers in the Palmer area in the 1930s speak about how they learned to make a living off the land in a brand new climate for American farmers. 

I was literally energized by both their "can do" approach to solving wickedly challenging problems (e.g. trying to keep an instream kinetic energy unit free of river debris) and the sheer audacity of their vision for affordable and practical energy solutions in a State where energy costs can determine the fate of communities.  It was particularly pleasing to see how a group of High School students from Cordova is using methane from food scraps in the school kitchen to power a lawn mower!

All of those presentations and the subsequent Q+A session will soon be uploaded to the ACEP emerging energy website -  http://energy-alaska.wikidot.com/eet.  You can also learn more about the seawater heat pump project there... we are on track to be operational by early summer and so stay tuned for future posts!

Bringing Alaska's Oceans to DC

Seward High School students Brianna Honebein, Jacob Marshall, Maggie Herbert and Rain Becker who are representing Alaska at the National Student Summit. More information about the group and their project can be found on their wikipage: http://alaskasealifecentersummitdelegation.wikispaces.com/.

This week 4 students from Alaska accompanied by two Alaska SeaLife Center educators (Adrienne Moretti and Laurie Stuart Morrow) are in Washington D.C. participating in the 3rd National Student Summit on the Ocean and Coasts which is organized through ther Coastal America partnership (see http://www.coastalamerica.gov/). The summit is focused on the Third Principle of Ocean Literacy which addresses the influence of the ocean on weather and climate.
This summit is being held at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural History.  The purpose of this summit is to inspire students to protect, preserve, and restore coastal ecosystems through community involvement and encourage them to pursue future academic and career paths in the marine and environmental sciences. The Alaska students are one of twenty student delegations from Coastal Ecosystem Learning Centers around the United States and Mexico.
This is the second time that the Coastal America and Alaska SeaLife Center’s Coastal Ecosystem Learning Center Partnership has supported Alaskan high school students to visit D.C. This will be a tremendous learning opportunity for these students as well as a chance to share their knowledge about Alaska’s oceans.
The summit has some exciting keynote speakers including: Jean-Michel Cousteau, Ocean Explorer and Film Producer; Dr. Sylvia Earle, Marine Biologist and National Geographic Explorer in Residence; Jack Hanna, Zookeeper and Wildlife expert; Dr. Nancy Knowlton, Smithsonian Institution’s Sant Chair for Marine Science; and Jim Toomey, Cartoonist and Creator of Sherman’s Lagoon.
When not presenting or attending workshops, the students will also have the opportunity to participate in educational opportunities such as visiting the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, the Air & Space Museum, Memorials, visiting Capitol Hill and congressional offices.

For more details see:
The JASON Project Interactive Broadcast with students, 12:00 p.m. and 3:00 p.m. EST, February 16, 2011 - http://www.jason.org/science/live/coastal_america/jason/event.aspx

Student Summit presentations and overview -  http://studentsummit.wikispaces.com/

Share the Warmth: help us secure funding from Winter 2011 GuideStar-KIMBIA Nonprofit Giveaway

You know what I think:
....I could not be more proud of what we accomplish – often under very challenging conditions – here on the frontlines of arctic marine research.  

But what do you think?
Tell the world what you think of THE ALASKA SEALIFE CENTER and help us receive $5,000 to toward our mission! 

The ASLC has an opportunity to receive $5,000 from GuideStar USA, Inc., a leading source of nonprofit information, and KIMBIA, a group that empowers nonprofits and other organizations to increase giving; a gift that they are making available through their Winter 2011 GuideStar-KIMBIA Nonprofit Giveaway. This generous gift could help us accomplish our mission of generating and sharing scientific knowledge to promote understanding and stewardship of Alaska’s marine ecosystem - we have many deserving small projects that we could accomplish for $5k, including:
* installation of new television monitors to better show visitors our animals in quarantine
* construction of a new marine literature display featuring the publications of great Alaskan writers
* development of a new interpretive panel to describe our research on Cook Inlet belugas
* funding a summer intern to gain experience in marine education

Your reviews will help document how we are "making an impact".  Anyone with firsthand knowledge about us who is not a paid employee of the Alaska SeaLife Center — visitors, donors, community members, research and education partners and supporters of our cause generally — can write a review about us on GuideStar. All reviews will appear in our profile on both GuideStar and GreatNonProfits, GuideStar’s partner that makes it possible to write and post reviews. You are limited to posting only one review.

To write a review, please click on http://www2.guidestar.org/organizations/92-0132479/seward-association-advancement-marine-science.aspx.  You will see the Seward Association for the Advancement of Marine Science, aka, the Alaska SeaLife Center “Write a Review” link on the left side of the page.

We thank you in advance for taking the time to support the ASLC.

Please feel free to pass this message along!
_________________________________________________________________

About the Winter 2011 GuideStar-KIMBIA Nonprofit Giveaway
The giveaway begins on February 1, 2011, and ends at 11:59 p.m. EDT February 28, 2011. The organization that has received the most number of reviews on www.guidestar.org and www.greatnonprofits.org during this period will recieve $5,000.  For more information go to http://www2.guidestar.org/rxg/update-nonprofit-report/sweepstakes-official-rules.aspx.

Connecting with our Oceans via NOSB Artwork

Some years ago, I helped organize an art competition in Indonesia that asked students to describe what aspect of their "natural world" was important to them. After reviewing hundreds of entries, the then Minister of Fisheries and Marine Affairs lamented that nearly all entries depicted forests and land animals - less than 10% of entries focused on marine life which was pretty surprising for a country that has more sea than land.
That caused me to ponder how artists select subjects and how they express their values through art.

I have been really impressed with the vibrant "marine art" scene in Alaska - there are clearly many amazingly talented and concerned artists who bring Alaska's seas to life.  But I wondered if that same sense of passion was nurtured in younger artists?

Imagine then my delight in viewing entries in the 2011 National Ocean Science Bowl (NOSB) Art Show, "Ocean Connection" which are currently on display in the Alaska SeaLife Center atrium. As these photos indicate, they feature a diverse array of sculptures, paintings and drawings representing many facets of marine life.  While this is clearly a different context than the Indonesian contest, walking around these painting evokes  a strong sense of optimism about how the next generation sees their future interwoven with the future of our oceans. 

I encourage anyone visiting Seward in the next week or so to come in and have a look at these as they give a fascinating insight into how people view and feel about our amazing marine ecosystems and the diversity of life in those systems.

14th National Ocean Science Bowl in Seward - thank you teachers and students!

I had the privilege to be invited to join UAF Faculty to judge the oral presentations at the the 14th annual Alaska Region National Ocean Sciences Bowl, also called the Tsunami Bowl, which was held in Seward Feb. 4-6. The competition was hosted by the UAF Seward Marine Center and some 17 teams from 15 high schools across Alaska, from Unalaska to Scammon Bay to Ketchikan, competed.

The competition consists of two equally weighted parts: a tournament-style academic competition designed to challenge students' knowledge of ocean sciences; and a research project that has both written and public speaking components. This year, the research project focused on human responses to oceanic events.

I was simply blown away by the quality and creativity of the research presented -projects ranged from pressing issues in local communities (e.g. paralytical shellfish poisoning research undertaken by Ketchikan High students) to insights in to the challenges facing our oceans globally (e.g. students from Wasilla Career and Tech High presenting an analysis of cyanide fishing in Wakatobi national park in Indonesia).
 
This was my first NOSB and I left impressed with the exceptional organization of the event by UAF staff, with the enthusiasm of the coaches and mentors for each student team and by the obvious commitment of the students to excellence in marine science.  As Seward High Principal, Trevan Walker noted in his welcome... "it is great to see an academic competition gain such a high level of student and community participation as all too often we see that in sporting competitions only". 

I hoped that all the talent scouts in the audience were paying attention as there was clearly some great talent on offer in the competition. I also hope that all participants are able to realize their potential as they move into higher education!  The world needs more students like these...