The IERE has announced its support of the City of Austin’s Plug Hybrid Initiative. Our Executive Director Rita Schenck said “The United States will never achieve energy independence until it finds a way replace fossil fuel driven engines. A plug hybrid vehicle is a big step towards that end. The City of Austin’s effort towards developing the market for plug hybrid cars uses the strength of market forces, and we are please to be able to support it.” IERE will be working with partners within the state of Washington and nationally to make plug in hybrid vehicles a reality, starting with its co-sponsorship of the Advanced Vehicle Initiative, along with the Port of Chelan County and others.
View the press release

An Island Eyes Energy Independence - video on YouTube that talks about the proposed Vashon Public Utility District.

Press release - Pacific Northwest Communities Could Exist on Renewable Energy

Pacific Northwest Energy Independent Communities - Executive Summary

Energy Independent Communities: Briefing for 34th District Democrats - Slide Presentation (pdf)

Energy Independent Vashon: A Public Utility District Proposal Slide Presentation (pdf)

Just released - Pacific Northwest Energy Independent Communities - A 10-year Plan - The Institute for Environmental Research and Education (IERE) has recently completed a study of the engineering, economics and social aspects of taking a community to energy independence. As a model, the study used the Vashon-Maury Island community, a grid linked community of 11,000 in central Puget Sound. The results are fully applicable to any Pacific Northwest community, and many of the results are applicable to the entire developed world.

Energy systems have long been recognized as not only a primary driver for the economy, but also a major source of environmental impacts. The use of fossil fuel energy has led to amazing standards of living, while causing equally amazing environmental problems ranging from cancer and asthma to acid rain and global climate change.

The question arises whether it is possible to provide a high standard of living to all without causing environmental devastation, and if so, how to accomplish that. We believe that the key to accomplishing that goal is to have communities take charge of their energy future, making best use of the renewable energy available locally. We call this concept Energy Independent Communities.

The work you see here is based on using Vashon Island as a demonstration of that concept, and extracting lessons for the whole world. The Pacific Northwest Economic Region has recognized these efforts by naming Vashon-Maury Island its first demonstration sustainable community.

Engineering students at UW studied replacement options for the battery pack in our 1999 Ford Ranger electric vehicle. Their report details various options.