Happy Memorial Day and thanks to all veterans and soldiers!

Dawn & I had the great pleasure of attending the Upper Valley Solar Sprint today in Lebanon, NH. Students from the Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth College organized this event as part of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Junior Solar Sprint (JSS) Car Competitions. Middle School teams from the Upper Valley of Vermont and New Hampshire worked to design and build solar cars to compete in race and design categories.


The students designed their solar cars based on specific criteria and rules. For example, the motor and solar panel were purchased and had to be used in the car without modification while the rest of the vehicle could be made from any other materials. The objective was to build a solar car that raced on a 20 meter racecourse using the sun as its only source of power.


The students who raced their solar cars today did a fantastic job and had some very impressive (and fast) cars! The winners are going on to the Northeast Junior Solar Sprint Championship on June 13th in Springfield, MA. Nice job everyone!

Congratulations to Kevin Gagnon, a Master Electrician in groSolar’s Billerica, MA office and to John Selby, a Project Manager in groSolar’s Jessup, MD office, who both recently received NABCEP Certification. Great work guys!

groSolar will be participating in the Vermont Business & Industry Expo next week at the Sheraton Conference Center in Burlington, VT. This is a two-day show displaying the best of Northern New England. Stop by and visit groSolar at booth #148.

VT EXPO 2010

As you well know, we’re in the business of the sun but let me wax poetic for a moment about water. Specifically where your water comes from. I recently spent a few gorgeous days in the Florida Keys. They are paradise with great food, lots of activities, incredible sunsets, white sandy beaches and ocean side pools. They also have thousands of tourists visit each month whom in addition to relaxing with a good book by the pool also shower, drink water and use the toilet. I found out when I was there that the potable water for Key West is pumped in from over 100 miles away on the Florida mainland. (In defense of the Florida Keys Aqueduct Authority, they have a couple of seawater desalination plants which produce freshwater from ocean saltwater- impressive technology.) So needless to say water conservation is a big issue and bottled water is a big industry. But is it sustainable? We talk about peak oil but what about peak water?

So, where is this long-winded post going? It’s a message to be conscious of where your water comes from and what you do with it. The city of Concord, MA recently banned the sale of bottled water in their town. The bottled water industry ($10 billion dollars) is obviously not very happy about this but why do they have to tell me that my tap water isn’t good enough? We at groSolar recently took the No Disposable Water Bottle Pledge to not purchase disposable water bottles. A number of employees also harvest rainwater to use for plants and gardens. Can you commit to not purchasing disposable water bottles? Help the environment and save yourself some money!

And check out The Story of Bottled Water, from the people who brought you The Story of Stuff.

Leave it to the folks at GE to come up with a cool application that lets you view the cost of all of your home appliances. It shows an easy graphic of the appliances and lets you select if you want to see how much the energy costs to power the appliance, how much power it consumes in watts, how much energy it consumes in terms of gallons of gas and what a kilowatt hour of energy yields for that appliance.  It does have some thinly veiled sales pitches included but overall it’’s easy to use and understand and you can customize it for your location. Definitely worth checking out.

GE Home Appliance Energy Use

One of our very own Outside Sales Reps has been training for a 100 mile bike ride to take place in June. Bill Dudjoc, who covers sales in CT, started training for the ride at the beginning of this year. He is riding as part of the Team in Training which raises money and awareness for The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. Bill’s century ride will begin in Stateline, NV and continue north around Lake Tahoe entering CA before coming back around the lake. Bill has been training an average of 6 days a week for this ride and will have biked more than 1500 miles by the time the ride takes place in June. He has also raised over $6,500 and expects to hit $7,000 by June.

Go Billy Go!

Flying to any destination lately leaves a bit to be desired. Between long security lines, being nickel & dimed for luggage, stale peanuts/pretzels and cranky travelers there is still one bright spot: The SkyMall catalog. Oh how I love the SkyMall catalog. I never new that a roll-up electric piano existed, let alone that I actually needed one. Thanks to SkyMall I can now personalize my meat (custom branding), have a glass of wine always close at hand (wine glass on a necklace), and tan my feet (foot tanner).

Yes, you can window shop to your hearts content to find everything you could ever want and everything you never knew you needed. There are also quite a few solar products available on SkyMall which tells me how mainstream solar is becoming.  Everything from solar lights and chargers to solar powered color changing gazing balls for the garden. The Smiling Solar Tiki Torches are a personal favorite!

Check out “The Most Ridiculous SkyMall Products Ever” from the Huffington Post for a good laugh and don’t forget your Solar Moler.