September 2009 From The Chair

I hope that everyone had a pleasant summer. I just spent a week vacation with my family in the mountains. It was a good time to be with family. I was also able to go to a high school class reunion in Ohio the follow-on weekend.
Our Vice Chair, Greg Hodges, has quite a fall lineup for our technical programs. The September program will be hosted by our newly formed Power and Energy Society (PES) Chapter and will be on the offshore wind power research that is currently underway by the Virginia Coastal Energy Research Consortium. I am excited about this topic. There was a Spectrum article not so long ago on the issues that Germany was having in establishing an offshore wind farms (see July 2009). I think that was a good article in dealing with the issues (political, environmental and even engineering) that might confront us in Virginia in developing our wind farms. We are expecting quite a turnout for this event and have elected to have the meeting at Clark-Nexsen courtesy of our past chair, Kurt Clemente. Thanks again Kurt.
In October, Greg has scheduled a field trip to Muelhbauer in Newport News. This will be a tour of a semiconductor and RFID manufacturing plant. I always liked field trips back in school and this seems like a good opportunity to see for ourselves what it takes to run a plant such as this. This is another excellent technical program that should be interesting to all of our members.
In November, we have decided to move the student paper competition from January to November. I think that this will be in keeping with the student’s schedules as many will be completing senior projects and we are far less intimidating than professors. I want to thank Anton Reidl of Christopher Newport University for volunteering to be Student Activities Chair for our Section.
I believe that the PES Chapter is looking to have a technical program during the month of November for those that have to maintain continuing education credits for the professional engineer requirements.
We presently have the Awards chair position open. I would also like to restructure the Educational Activities program. The Educational Activities program is for a person who will be the focal point for the section’s Educational Activities. If you have any questions about these positions or desire to work in these areas, please contact any member of the Executive Committee. In addition, the Executive Committee is up for elections at the end of this year. If you have any desire to be the Chairman, Vice-Chair, Treasurer or Secretary, please contact our past-Chair, Kurt Clemente, kurt.clemente@ieee.org , who is heading up the Nominations Committee. I would like the nominations in by end of October, so that we can have elections in November. We were late last year in getting the positions filled and almost missed out on the 10% early reporting bonus that IEEE provides to sections.
Thanks again for all that you do for IEEE and I am looking forward to this fall’s technical program. Good job Greg.
Regards,
James Bolitho
2009 Chair
Hampton Roads Section
jbolitho@ieee.org

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Brain Teaser Challenge - August

Sorry I missed a month with the BTC. My biggest vice is that I volunteer too much, and my volunteer work has been dominating my time. I guess this column is one of my volunteer jobs, now that I think about it. Anyway, some folks have asked me to mention that one of my big volunteer jobs is as the new international chair of the Humanitarian Technology Challenge, Reliable Electricity Committee. This project is sponsored by the United Nations Foundation and the IEEE. We are a large group of volunteer professionals and academicians who are dedicated to finding better ways to help people in need by the application of technology. These could be disaster victims or people who have never had infrastructure of any kind. Lighting, better food and water, communications, and better medical care are among our objectives.

I was recently asked about consulting on a project to collect deuterium from the ocean. We all know that deuterium is found in much higher concentrations in the sea than in the atmosphere. Perhaps the heavier molecules find it harder to make the transition from liquid to gas phase on the surface, so most of the evaporation is of the lighter isotopes. So the problem today is - how big a container do I need to hold 1 mole of H2 at STP? Don't light a match.

Reply to Butch Shadwell at b.shadwell@ieee.org (email), 904-410-9751 (fax), 904-410-9750 (v), 3308 Queen Palm Dr., Jacksonville, FL 32250-2328. (http://www.shadtechserv.com) The names of correct respondents may be mentioned in the solution column.

Brain Teaser Challenge - "June"

I attended a conference recently at the National Academy of Sciences in Washington DC, called the Humanitarian Technology Challenge. It was sponsored by the IEEE and the United Nations Foundation, among others. The objective was to organize volunteers from around the world to come up with better ways to apply technology to relieving human suffering.

Even though I am not really a power guy, I found myself engaged in a number conversations about power quality. We were talking about the amount of energy that gets converted to heat from harmonic distortion of the power waveform. Your challenge this month, should you choose to accept it, is to explain why most of the harmonic energy you find on the power mains is in the odd harmonics of the fundamental?


Reply to Butch Shadwell at b.shadwell@ieee.org (email), 904-410-9751 (fax), 904-410-9750 (v), 3308 Queen Palm Dr., Jacksonville, FL 32250-2328. (http://www.shadtechserv.com) The names of correct respondents may be mentioned in the solution column.

The Open Channel for Summer 2009

Front Page Tidewater Science Fair
Page 2 From the Chair
Page 3 IEEE Energy Policy Fly in to Capital
Hill
Page 3 IEEE Job Site Redesign
Page 3 Educator Conference Participation
Page 4 IEEE HR PES Update
Page 4 Brain Teaser—June 2009

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