By Nyesha Stone
Dan Folkman, videographer, discussed the future of solar power and what it would take to get there.
He even had Executive Director of Renew Wisconsin Tyler Huebner give a quick presentation on solar power via video chat. MKE 350 hosted Folkman’s Hope: The Unstoppable Surge in Solar event at the Riverside Park Urban Ecology Center on May 9.
Folkman has produced a video on the Solar Buy movement in Milwaukee along with other videos regarding climate change activism. According to Huebner’s PowerPoint, the solar industry employs more than twice as many workers as the entire coal industry.
The community center, in the basement, of the Urban Ecology center is where the event was held. The audience was an older crowd; all interested in the future of solar power.
One attendee asked Huebner how solar power could be introduced into the urban community with the lack of wind power. Huebner didn’t have a definite answer, but according to another audience member, scientists were working on a way to store wind power.
Huebner suggested contacting your city if people were interested to learn more about how to switch over to solar power.
Many don’t know, but if you switched to solar power you could pay an exit fee to no longer be powered by Wisconsin electric services, said Huebner.
Sixteen stores in Southeastern Wisconsin have installed multiple solar panels for energy. Over time, dirty fuels will diminish and green energies will expand, said Folkman.
While Huebner was giving his presentation, he was also watching his children who made an appearance on camera.
As their faces popped on the screen, Folkman thought out loud “look at these kids…it’s about them.”
Folkman believes solar power is the way of the future for the future generations.
It’s already been proven that with the constant changes in technology, one-day technology will surpass the need for fossil fuels, said Folkman. Towards the end of the event, Folkman showed the audience research conducted by Chairman/ Chief Scientist of the Rocky Mountain Institute Amory Lovins.
It showed there was a 100 percent chance reusable utility power by 2050 could be a real possibility, according to the data. Folkman provided the data then left it open to the audience to share their opinions on what they thought was possible.
Some audience members were excited about the possibility, while others questioned the reality of such a transformation. For more information on solar power, visit http://www.renewwisconsin.org.
