Education (.edu):
Several of us here at Focused Sun have an academic background. Dr. Shawn Buckley has been a Mechanical Engineering professor and solar energy expert at MIT, Berkeley, UCLA and Huazhong University of Science and Technology (HUST) in China, one of China’s best engineering schools. Prof. Amir Abtahi teaches solar energy classes at Florida Atlantic University. He is the Florida guru of solar, having installed solar energy systems there 25 years ago. What better teaching tool than a Microgrid. It has thermal and heat transfer aspects, microcontroller aspects, mechanical and production aspects and simulation aspects. It is a complete power plant on a small enough platform to understand every part of it. We have worked with universities on partnered research. Prof. Dave Warsinger (Warsinger Water Lab, Purdue University) has partnered with Focused Sun on a unique desalination method called “No-Air” desalination. The method combines Multiple Effect Distillation (MED) with the latest membrane desalination. Our partnership won a DOE competition for the best way to produce clean water from Focused Sun’s high temperature heat. |