UVM's Center for Research on Vermont seminars to cover environmental catastrophe, Smart Grid

Release Date: 10-21-2010
 

On Wednesday, October 27, Harlan Morehouse, a doctoral candidate in geography at the University of Minnesota, will speak on "Environmental Catastrophe, or the Catastrophe of the Environment? Remarks on Politics and Community in the Shadow of Ruin."
 

The event, part of the Center for Research on Vermont Research-in-Progress Series, will take place at 7:30 p.m. in Memorial Lounge, Waterman Building.
Drawing on ethnographic research conducted in rural Vermont, Morehouse will discuss how the conventional approach to understanding the environment in an abstract sense -- as an entity subject to but distinct from human action -- plays a role in the ecological catastrophe around us. The seminar will pose questions, Morehouse says, about "alternative political practices and oppositional forms of community" that challenge this way of thinking.
 

A second Research-in-Progress seminar, "Smart Grid 101: What Does it Mean for Vermont," featuring Robert Dostis, of Green Mountain Power, will take place Tuesday, November 30 at 7:30 p.m. in North Lounge, Billings.
 

This seminar is designed as an introduction to Vermont's upcoming Smart Grid system, which will give consumers around the state the ability to access real-time information about their electric usage. The addition of high speed information and communication technology to the electric grid will change the way utilities operate and how customers interact with them -- resulting in more reliable service, less consumption and a smaller carbon footprint.