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| Where we stayed: At anchor off Swallow Island on the Tennessee River. |
With permission, I thought I'd share a email we received recently from another person who is interested in solar-powered boats. Carter Quillen is an engineer who has developed a solar-refrigerated ice cream cart.
Carter writes:
"I was both disappointed
and excited to hear a report of your voyage on my local public radio station in
east Tennessee this evening. Excited because it's great to see like minded
people demonstrating the potential of alternative energy, and
disappointed because we've been working two years on making the same
voyage you are doing and you've beat us to it.
"I suppose at least we'll
be able to claim our boat is recycled! I'm refitting a 30-year-old, bilge keel concrete boat that I saved from destruction about four years
ago. We hope to equip it with
a solar-electric drive and cruise the Great Loop, promoting alternative
energy.
"I'm a mechanical engineer
who has worked on various solar energy applications for almost
30 years. My specialty has been solar thermal, and I'm currently working on
developing a solar refrigeration system for homes, as well as an
innovative approach to commercial scale solar water heating.
"Refrigeration alone
accounts for nearly 10 percent of the electricity consumed in the residential
sector, and water heating accounts for almost 20 percent. We've had fully developed
technologies to displace all that consumption for decades, yet they're not widely used.
"I think that any
meaningful solution to our energy and environmental challenges will need
to be applied from the bottom up, and not the top down. I have been a
strong advocate for the development of a decentralized energy
infrastructure--where every home applies load- specific alternative energy
technology such as solar water heating, refrigeration, air conditioning, and
heating--rather than setting up “solar farms” with acres of solar
panels that continue to feed our current inefficient energy distribution system."
"I'm not sure yet if news of your voyage has inspired or discouraged me. (Inspired, we hope!) Unfortunately, we won't be getting under way for at least another year or two. I've been working on the refit design and collecting some of the parts and pieces we'll need while saving money for the refit. We hope to begin in earnest down in Fort Myers, Florida, this winter."
Thanks, Carter, and good luck. Any other solar boaters want to tell their story?
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