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SUMMARY:IC Colloquium jointly organized with EcoCloud : Sustainable energy
  - without the hot air
DTSTART:20120914T121500
DTEND:20120914T140000
DTSTAMP:20260415T072305Z
UID:0cad369d12ec80cb9fa11e4378d6cccf8bb768a34bd8563fc067957d
CATEGORIES:Conferences - Seminars
DESCRIPTION:David MacKay\, Chief Scientific Advisor\, DECC\nProfessor of N
 atural Philosophy\, University of Cambridge\nAbstract\nHow easy is it get 
 off our fossil fuel habit? What do the fundamental limits of physics say a
 bout sustainable energy? Could a typical "developed" country live on its o
 wn renewables? The technical potential of renewables is often said to be "
 huge" - but we need to know how this "huge" resource compares with another
  "huge": our\nhuge power consumption. The public discussion of energy poli
 cy needs numbers\, not adjectives. In this talk I will express power consu
 mption\nand sustainable production in a single set of personal\, human-fri
 endly units. Getting off fossil fuels is not going to be easy\, but it is 
 possible.\n\n\nBiography\nDavid MacKay was appointed as Chief Scientific A
 dvisor to the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) on 1st Octobe
 r 2009. The Chief Scientific Advisor’s role is to ensure that the Depart
 ment’s policies and operations\, and its contributions to wider Governme
 nt issues\, are underpinned by the best science and engineering advice ava
 ilable.\n\nDavid MacKay studied Natural Sciences at Trinity College\, then
  went to Caltech to complete a PhD in Computation and Neural Systems. In 1
 992 he returned to Cambridge as a Royal Society research fellow at Darwin 
 College. In 1995 he became a university lecturer in the Department of Phys
 ics\, where he was promoted in 1999 to a Readership and in 2003 to a Profe
 ssorship in Natural Philosophy. He was elected a fellow of the Royal Socie
 ty in 2009.\n\nDavid MacKay’s research interests include reliable comput
 ation with unreliable hardware\, and communication systems for the disable
 d. He believes that what the climate-change discussion needs is clear\, si
 mple numbers\, so that we can understand just how big our challenge is\, a
 nd not be duped by wishful thinking. His book on the subject (Sustainable 
 Energy - Without The Hot Air: David MacKay\, UIT Cambridge\, 2009) has rec
 eived endorsements from all sectors and from all political parties\; The E
 conomist called it “a tour de force”\, and The Guardian called it “t
 his year's must-read book”.\n\n\nFor further information please see:\nht
 tp://www.withouthotair.com/\n
LOCATION:BC 01 https://plan.epfl.ch/?room==BC%2001
STATUS:CONFIRMED
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