7/20/2010: Op-Ed in the RG by 2 UO alumni and the ASUO president against the ORI Riverfront research building:
… Despite decades of overwhelming opposition by students, faculty and community members to development north of the railroad tracks, the university hasn’t held a single public meeting related to the placement or design of the ORI building.
It should have been no surprise that intense opposition would emerge when the university unilaterally announced in 2008 that it had entered into a contract with Trammell Crow, a Texas-based developer, to construct the first of many proposed suburban-style office buildings on the riverfront. …
Had there been an opportunity for meaningful public dialogue at an early stage, the university would have heard loud and clear that the people of Eugene want ORI to have a new home, but not if it means paving the riverfront for a parking lot and erecting a building that looks like it could be part of any suburban office complex in America.
The OIT students will install 25 solar photovoltaic panels donated by a German company, TUV Rheinland, from its Arizona testing laboratory. The panels convert sunlight to electricity that will light schools and clinics, charge batteries, power computers and charge cell phones. The students will design the systems and work with local technicians to install and test them.
Schools are the first priority, with the requirement that they are least 10 kilometers from the electrical connection, have at least 200 students and demonstrate they can maintain the systems and protect them from thieves.
Worthy sites are not hard to find, says Petrovic, because about 80 percent of the people have no electricity.
I’m no economist, but I’ll guess that the ratio of the marginal utility from a solar panel in Tanzania to one in Oregon is say, 1000 to 1? Putting solar cells on a building in Oregon makes the world worse off.
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