In Illinois, A Smart Power Grid Begins With A Promise For The Future
Substation No. 505 in Oak Park, with its nondescript cluster of bulky transformers and web of power lines, seems an unlikely place for Commonwealth Edison to start the $2.6 billion smart grid it says will prepare the region’s antiquated power system for the digital age.
The Oak Park substation is a pilot project approved in 2009 and is meant to test new technology and the savings it can generate. As ComEd’s first “intelligent” substation, No. 505 is outfitted with scores of state-of-the-art electronic sensors that monitor the flow of electricity. The sensors can analyze up to 1,500 pieces of information every two seconds and alert ComEd managers when — or even before — a problem happens.
Val Jensen, a vice president at ComEd, said the current grid was “relatively dumb, meaning that we put power into the grid at the plant and then it flows according to the law of physics through all of those wires.” The new system, he said, “can’t tell when a power line goes down, when you lose power at your house, when a substation is overloaded or overheated.”
Read more about Illinois’ Smart Grid technology at the New York Times, with content provided by the Chicago News Cooperative.
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New Collaboration to Benefit Women Faculty in STEM
(Newswise) — Northwestern University and the University of Chicago have launched the Chicago Collaboration for Women in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics, a three-year effort to enhance the recruitment and advancement of women faculty members in those fields.
“The University of Chicago and Northwestern are vitally concerned about the advancement of women in STEM at our respective institutions, and through this collaboration we have dedicated ourselves to making significant progress,” said UChicago Provost Thomas Rosenbaum, the John T. Wilson Distinguished Service Professor in Physics.
Important elements of the collaboration involve studying the apparent relative strengths and weaknesses of the respective institutions when it comes to fostering a positive climate for women in STEM, said Northwestern Provost Daniel Linzer. “As we began working together on this important initiative, we recognized that we could potentially gain some valuable new insights, not just for Northwestern and the University of Chicago, but for other like-minded institutions,” Linzer said.
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U.S. lost a quarter of high-tech jobs, Illinois 31 percent, in last decade
More than a quarter of the nation’s high-tech manufacturing jobs were lost in the past decade, according to a new government study.
The United States shed 28 percent, or 687,000 jobs, in high-tech sectors since reaching its peak of 2.5 million in 2000, according to the study released Tuesday by the National Science Board, the policymaking body for the National Science Foundation. In Illinois the losses were greater, as the state shed more than 31 percent of its high-tech manufacturing jobs during the last decade.
“It took years for this position to erode and it’ll take years to return,” said Matthew Summy, president of the Illinois Science & Technology Coalition, an industry group that represents research and development interests at universities, federal laboratories and companies. Read more at chicagotribune.com.
In Illinois the losses were greater, as the state shed more than 31 percent of its high-tech manufacturing jobs during the last decade.
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