December 19, 2007
The News-Review
Tim Gannon

Global Warming is a Challenge

Can an electric-powered boat in Greenport be run on solar energy?

That's a question some science students in Riverhead High School have been considering recently, and now the kids are even looking into what it would take to make that happen.

The students are part of science teacher Bob Jester's research class at the high school, and the project is part of a nationwide competition called the Lexus Environmental Challenge, which will provide a total of $1 million in grants and scholarships to various schools. The competition "encourages teachers to integrate creative lesson plans into their classrooms that help teach middle and high school students to apply what they've learned to make improvements to their community by participating in four team challenges," according to Lexus, which is a division of Toyota.

Choosing among the four challenges, which deal with land, air, water and climate, Mr. Jester's class decided to do a project about climate, and, specifically, carbon dioxide emissions from power plants.

The class' environmental action plan, according to Mr. Jester, was "to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from power plants by proposing the development of an educational project that produces no carbon dioxide. We intend to implement this project for global warming awareness and education in the community."

As part of the project, they are asking community members to help by participating in an online survey about global warming. That survey can be found by going to the district Web site, www.riverhead.net, then clicking on "links and resources," which is under the main picture, and then clicking on eboards, which is on the left side of the page. From there, click on "Mrs. Skinner's Physics Site," and then click on "Research Class Current Environmental Survey," which will provide instructions on how to send the completed survey to Mr. Jester. They've already done some surveying in the school.

So what does all this have to do with a boat in Greenport?

Mr. Jester said that before he even knew about the Lexus competition, the Riverhead Town energy advisory committee had suggested that the students look into alternative energy by doing a video where they interview people on that subject. This is where they got started.

"I grew up in Greenport, and somewhere in our conversation, we started talking about greenhouse gases," Mr. Jester recalled. "I said, if you want to see something really neat, there's a guy out in Greenport who has been running a little electric boat and creates very little pollution because it doesn't put all those hydrocarbons and exhaust into the water, and because he's not running a diesel or gasoline engine. He has an electric motor."

The students wanted to see the boat, which they did in late October, and it was around then that Mr. Jester first heard about the Lexus competition.

"I said, this is what these kids have been doing all along," Mr. Jester recalled.

The boat, called "Glory," is owned by Dave Berson and Andrew Rowsom and runs on electricity. They've run the boat for nine years, giving tours during the summer.

But it gets its electricity from plugging in at the dock, where the electricity comes from Greenport Village's electric system. Some of that energy comes from hydropower, Mr. Jester said, but the village also purchases some energy from coal-burning sources.

Along the way, the students started investigating whether the boat could be run entirely on solar energy, Mr. Jester said. The solar panels would have to be located on the dock, since solar panels on the boat would make it too unstable, he added.

During the course of their research, the students also have met with Gary Minnick, who owns Go Solar in Aquebogue and suggested the possibility of not only running the boat on solar energy but also doing what is called "reverse metering," whereby solar energy generated by solar panels at the dock would be sold back into the power grid.

By using solar panels to power the boat, "you are completely deleting the carbon imprint, meaning you are not putting any carbon dioxides into the atmosphere," said junior Adam McKay. "Now, it's not burning oil, but it's still taking energy from power plants that put carbon dioxide into the environment."

Adam said he feels solar energy is a wave of the future.

"Eventually, we are going to run out of fossil fuels," he said.

The class visited the boat in October and had many questions for Mr. Berson.

"I felt like I was playing 'Jeopardy' with geniuses," Mr. Berson recalled. "It was so much fun."

The kids are not actually planning to build the solar panels at the dock, but they are researching things like the cost of doing so, where the solar panels should be placed and at what angles, and where to find money to fund such a project, Mr. Jester said.

"Andrew and I feel honored and privileged that these kids have chosen 'Glory' to be the focus of their energy," Mr. Berson said.

In fact, running the boat on solar power is something he's always considered doing, but he said he didn't know how to write the grants to acquire the funding to do so.

Coincidentally, that's now one of the things Mr. Jester's students are doing.

Mr. Berson said he can run the boat for an entire summer on less than $70. He estimates that the boat has prevented more than 168,000 pounds of carbon dioxide from going into the atmosphere over its nine years of operation, and that it would cost about $2,100 to run the boat for a season on diesel.

"'Glory' is the only environmentally friendly boat in New York State that is Coast Guard-certified to carry passengers," Mr. Berson said.

So far, the students said, the survey results have shown that people in their 40s are more interested in alternative fuel than younger people or senior citizens.

"The generation ahead of us seemed more aware of this issue than people our age," sophomore Christian Blank said.

The students, many of whom hope to pursue science-related careers, also said they learned a lot by doing the surveys and how important teamwork is.

Mr. Jester said that whether the boat ever runs on solar or how the students do in the competition isn't that important.

"I want them to learn how to get information and do things with the information," he said. "That was the whole project, to see if it was possible to do something to somehow affect greenhouse gases. Where it led is that we said we'll take our findings and present it to the Greenport Village Board, not because we expect the Village Board is going to propel the boat with solar energy, but to make them aware it could be done. But now the kids are so excited over it, they said that after we get done with the competition, we'd like to maybe write grants or look into other sources of funding to really do this project."