Renewable Energy and the Palouse

Last weekend my family and I went to the Northwest Renewable Energy Festival in Walla Walla, Washington. I have not been to Walla Walla in years. My only memory is when my uncle used to work there for the State Penitentiary. We left far too late; after a soccer game, discussions with the siding contractors working on our house, and a last minute request by my mother-in-law (whom I love dearly) to tag-along. When we were finally ready, we packed the five of us into my mother-in-law’s SUV (I felt a twang of guilt about this one, but it really held all of us comfortably, including the two car seats, and I figured we were carpooling after all) and headed off.

By the time we arrived at the festival we had missed most of the workshops, but were able to catch the kick-off for the Electric Car Endurance Race, which we watched for about 5 minutes (total race lasted over an hour)—my children were hot to get the “eyeball balloon hats” that other children were wearing from the Kid’s Zone. By the time we got there the Kid’s Zone was winding down, but the solar oven, earth/mud pit and solar fountain were still going strong. The balloon hats, however, still remained the hit.

We then visited all of the displays of wind power, solar hot water, biodiesel, green building and LED lightbulbs from vendors from Washington, Idaho and Oregon. Upon review of the schedule of events, I was particularly bummed that I missed the “Biodigester Panel: WSU’s Rot to Watt Program.” It seems that WSU received a $100,000 grant from the Department of Ecology this past January to finish building a portable anaerobic digester that turns farm waste, manure and household garbage into methane gas that can be burned to generate electricity. I think the whole methane/waste thing is fascinating, so I am determined to look into this further and it is so great that they are researching this stuff at WSU. In fact, a good portion of the speakers including the two keynote addresses, were from WSU—hard to knock those land-grant universities.

Although the festival was great (I will arrive earlier next year), the best part was seeing a part of the State that was in many ways new to me. Being only a three hour drive, you would think that I would know this landscape, but I was amazed by the beauty of the farmland, the canyon-like landscape, the drama of the isolated Palouse Falls and the wonderful small towns of Dayton, Waittsburg and Colfax. I had never even heard of Dayton before and was surprised to see a flourishing Main Street with local restaurants, thrift stores and healthy pedestrian activity. All this surrounded by beautiful farmland and wineries. It seemed almost too idyllic and too bad we were late for the Festival or I would have liked to stay awhile. Maybe next year.

For more information about the Northwest Renewable Energy Festival go to www.nwrefest.org. To find out what is happening with methane nationally go to the EPA's website: www.epa.gov/lmop/.