Interest in renewable energy solutions has grown significantly in the last decade. With current movements in public opinon as well as renewable mandates from state legislatures, finding feasible sites for renewable development has become a topic of great importance. Feasibility, however, encompasses more than just the availability of natural resources; current land use, legislation, load demand, environmental concerns, and cost all determine a site's potential for renewable development. Because determining a site's potential for renewable development involves many interdependent factors, we feel that the topic of renewables development could benefit from a high-level, systems-thinking approach. We aim to investigate these different factors and eventually develop a point-ranking system for feasibility.

 

 Naitik Bhatt (MASE 2010) and Jessica Stigile (ESE 2010), under the supervision of Dr. Arye Nehorai and Joshua York (ESE 2009), started this project in the Fall 2009 semester as ESE 497: Undergraduate Research. These two students drew upon their different Engineering backgrounds to tackle the problem from an interdisciplinary approach. In future semesters, this project could likely evolve into a campus-wide effort that involves students from Engineering, Art and Sciences, Business, and Law.

 

The goal of this project was to determine what factors influence a site's potential for renewable development and determine ways for states to meet their Renewables Portfolio Standards mandates. The first step in this research process involved selecting reliable data sets, formatting the data into a user-friendly database, and determining wind or PV solar capacity factors for different zones in the United States. Use the navigation bar to the left to learn about our research project and to access our database. The Final Report for the Fall 2009 semester is linked through the subpage found below. If you have any questions or comments, feel free to contact us at wugreenenergy@gmail.com.