Something more positive...

Something more positive...

I've been doing some interviews for Business as an Agent of World Benefit as part of a course I'm taking. Here is the official purpose of the interview process:

The goal is to gather information on businesses that have recognized a social or environmental issue and have solved it by turning it into a business opportunity. By bringing to foreground stories of such innovative enterprises, Business as an Agent of World Benefit at Case Western Reserve University hopes to generate a conversation amongst like-minded individuals about ways businesses can form a synergistic relationship with society, environment and the world.

Business is a powerful institution that has potential for resolving the problems plaguing the world. By designing innovative business models, businesses can ensure profits for its shareholders as well as stakeholders by contributing to world benefit. Going beyond philanthropy, business ethics and corporate social responsibility, when business acts as an agent of world benefit both sides of the equation- society and environment as well as the business entity- emerge with more self-sufficiency and prosperity.

Here is my write up from the first Interview:

A new source for green energy…

INTERVIEW 1 – Tim Braun, CEO, Lucid Energy

Story of Business Innovation: Write at least 300 words about the innovation itself. Please answer the following questions:

• WHAT is the innovation?
• HOW did the innovation emerge?
• WHO was involved in the creation of the innovation? What did they do?
• WHAT quotations from the interview best describe the innovation?

Once in a while, a new idea comes along that holds the promise of addressing a number of important and seemingly disparate problems. A new product under development by a 14 person start-up company in Goshen, Indiana, holds that promise. The disparate problems are the need for clean energy generation and water distribution. The new product is Northwest PowerPipeTM (NWPP).

NWPP is an innovative new product – perhaps a whole new industry – that captures and commercializes the energy of moving water in situations where traditional turbine technologies cannot work. The new product is the brainchild of Lucid Energy Technologies’ management and engineering team with cooperation from Northwest Pipe Company, and will be the first commercial application based on the innovative Gorlov Helical Turbine in a pressurized water system.

The Gorlov Helical Turbine (GHT) was invented by Alexander Gorlov in 1996. Gorlov, Professor Emeritus of mechanical engineering and director of the Hydro-Pneumatic Power Laboratory at Northeastern University, was awarded the prestigious ASME Thomas A. Edison Patent Award for his invention in May of 2001. The turbine design, a combination of a wing foil and a DNA spiral, is highly efficient in low flow fluid environments making it a game-changing technology for distributed power generation.

Lucid’s innovation was to modify the GHT into a spherical shape for installation in gravity fed water conveyance pipeline and wastewater systems to generate electricity. In many communities, especially in California, water is stored for municipal water systems in reservoirs upstream of the community. These reservoirs sometimes have traditional hydroelectric (or hydropower) dams on them, and those dams, such as the Hoover Dam on the Colorado River, incorporate traditional (or conventional) hydroelectric turbines. Water from these dams is also delivered for public consumption via large diameter pipes to downstream communities. The water in these pipes contains a great deal of energy, and NWPP will extract some of that energy to generate electricity.

While one system alone captures any where from 5 to 100 kW, multiple systems can be installed in series, still with minimal disruption in flow or pressure. Ultimately, the combined generating capacity may rival larger, capital intensive projects.

According to Braun, NWPP stands at the nexus of two pressing problems: energy and water.

“The more I learn about what we’re doing, the more I realize it’s as much of a water use issue as it is an energy issue. The water problem is as big as the energy problem. They’re inextricably linked.”

He went on, “Water conveyance is the single largest consumer of electricity in California. Water transmission and water treatment consumes 8 to 10 percent of all the electricity in the state of California. Water conveyance uses one third of the State of California’s electricity budget. So this is an immense energy issue. Most energy generation requires a lot of water. It also requires a lot of energy to supply water. Reducing the embedded energy in water is a major objective in the water scarce, population and agriculturally dense Pacific states. The fact that we have a zero water consumption electricity-producing device is a big deal. The fact that the device reduces the embedded energy in water is at a very interesting nexus of two problems.”

Impact of innovation: Write at least 250 words about the impact of the innovation:

• WHAT was the impact of the innovation? What people or organizations were affected?
• WHAT were the short-term effects? What were the long-term effects?
• WHAT observable evidence suggests that this impact has occurred?
• WHAT quotations from the interview best describe the impact?

Given that the product is still in development, it is too early to measure the contribution of NWPP to the energy grid. The company has installed a single prototype in one water delivery system (Riverside, CA). Though the output is relatively small, that prototype generates electricity at the expected rate, given the rate of water flow through the pipe. Furthermore, the NWPP system has an undetectable impact on the water flow. This is important because it means NWPP is able to extract energy from the water without degrading the water utility’s ability to deliver water to their customers.

In the meantime, perhaps the most important impact of the innovation is the creation of green energy jobs in Goshen, Indiana. Goshen is the county seat for Elkhart County, and the closest city to Goshen is Elkhart, just 10 miles away. During the economic collapse of 2008 – 2009, Elkhart has earned the dubious honor of being the “white hot center of the economic melt down Visited multiple times by President Obama during and after the 2008 presidential campaign, Elkhart County ranked near the top of nation in jobs lost during this period. The area has been heavily dependent on the recreational vehicle (RV) industry for jobs, and that industry was one of the first to collapse during the credit crisis.

According to Braun, the workers he “rescued” from the RV industry are exactly the people his company needs. They have the pragmatic, “can do” ability to solve mechanical and technical problems. He explained: “Most of our staff are former RV industry people. And they’re so much happier. They’d much rather work for a crazy, roller-coaster of a startup, and doing what we’re doing. Just working at the issue that we’re working at, employing people in jobs that they’re passionate about, in clean technology, in renewable energy, in downtown Goshen, in the heart of Elkhart County – the ‘white-hot center of the economic meltdown’ like the New York Times said – is an important success.”

The company’s invention has also attracted the attention of the U. S. Department of Energy. Lucid was awarded an SBIR grant in 2010, and Dr. Kristina Johnson, Under Secretary of Energy, cited the company in a presentation in April, 2010, with a CAD image of NWPP. She commented that NWPP is an emerging technology that the department is supporting. This is important validation of the company’s efforts.

Motivation and Purpose: Write at least 250 words about the motivation, purpose or inspiration behind the innovation.

• HOW did the original idea come about?
• WHAT was the motivation or purpose for doing the innovation?
• Does the innovation relate to a sense of mission, purpose or meaning? If so, HOW?
• WHAT quotations from the interview best illustrate the motivation behind the innovation?

Prior to joining Lucid, Braun had built a career in the socially responsible investment community. As an investment advisor with MMA Trust Company (a Socially Responsible Investment firm run by Mennonite Mutual Aid (MMA), and through involvement in the First Affirmative Financial Network, Braun had been exposed to businesses that were focused on sustainability in general, and renewable energy in particular. He had heard dozens of stories of entrepreneurs who had successfully built businesses designed to support a more sustainable world. For Braun, there came a point when he wanted to be closer to the solution, rather than being a middle man who was telling other people’s stories.

“I learned that the world has so many social and environmental problems that if you can figure out how to do this well, you can build a very successful business while pursuing your passions for a sustainable planet. I spent 10 years in the social investment industry, helping people get in touch with those stories of companies that are being very innovative in terms of social, environmental and economic objectives. And I got very tired of being the middle man and hearing all these stories, and conveying those to other people. I had a very viable role as the person helping leverage other people’s capital to bring things to the market who are doing good works. But at the same time, I wanted to write one of these stories. I wanted to get involved. I wanted to get my hands dirty, at the ground level. I wanted to be the story that somebody else is writing about, or telling their clients about.”

Headline: If your story were published on a front page of a local newspaper, what headline, or title, would you give it?
“Creative application of innovative turbine creates green jobs in the white hot center of the economic melt down”

Interviewers Story: Tell us your story. Write at least 200 words about your experience:

• Why were you interested in interviewing this person?
• What did you learn or how were you inspired from the interview?
• What was the best quote you heard during the interview?
• What did you find most interesting about the story?

I had met Tim several years ago. He was my neighbor and a passing acquaintance for a number of years and then I had run into him at a distant airport. We ended up getting bumped from the same flight and shared a round-about journey home together. That is when we first had conversations with him about sustainability. In the intervening years I had heard that he had joined this start up, and had been looking for an opportunity to reconnect and hear more of his story. The technology sounded amazing and creative and I wanted to learn more.

I was especially inspired by Tim’s passion to create something truly innovative and new in the green energy field. And he is facing huge hurdles to realize his dream. He has a great product idea, but due to the nature of water pipeline infrastructure his team has to design it to function with minimal maintenance for 25 years or more. So the technical challenges are enormous. And then the sales challenges are enormous. He has to find a perfect storm of circumstances of individual motivation, public readiness, and government support to get this product into use. And in the midst of that, he has to always remember that cash is king!

My favorite quote came near the end of the interview. We had been talking about theories of sustainable economics, and he said that he is very interested in questions of no-growth economics, and measuring the true costs of our current economic models. And then he said “However right now I’m just really focused on what do I have to do right now to be successful. I’m grateful that we’re working on a product that enables all these greater theoretical things that we’re talking about, but in reality, I just want to get the damn thing to work.”