Work on the TEX-Hermosa Beach project has officially begun! Lon Peters will work with the community lead, Kristy Morris, to conduct a study of feasible renewable energy technologies for Hermosa Beach to consider as it pursues its carbon neutrality goals.
Additionally, the project team welcomed a new collaborator this month, Abhishek Rao. Abhishek is a recent graduate of the solar energy engineering Master’s program at Arizona State University and currently works as a PV system design engineer for Sunrun, Inc. He joins the project team through the TEX Community Science Training Program, a new effort by TEX to enable individual students and early career scientists the opportunity to volunteer their time to support selected TEX projects. Abhishek will work directly with Lon on this community science project and learn how to connect his expertise to address local concerns and provide momentum toward local solutions. He looks forward to working directly with the city of Hermosa Beach and hopes to reproduce the results of this collaboration in other cities and communities.
Lon and Abhishek’s work will be supplemented by two independent research projects conducted by students at the University of California, Los Angeles. A group of undergraduate students will be exploring policy guidance and regulatory requirements related to solar, anaerobic digestion, wind and tidal energy generation for a capstone project. Meanwhile, students at the Anderson School of Business will study financial incentives to support small investments in renewable energy within Hermosa Beach. Although these projects will run parallel to and independently of the TEX project, the three teams will meet this winter to coordinate assumptions and ensure that no conflicts are present in the final products submitted to the city.
All work is expected to conclude in March 2017.
