Creating a sustainable energy infrastructure to be featured at IEEE Energy 2030 Conference

WASHINGTON (13 November 2008)-- With rising energy prices and concerns about future power supplies and the impact burning fossil fuels might have on the climate, the need to develop clean, reliable and affordable energy sources has become paramount.

The IEEE Energy 2030 Conference (http://ewh.ieee.org/conf/energy2030/) will examine the technology, policy and economic framework required to create a global sustainable energy infrastructure by 2030. More than 125 original papers and presentations are expected.

IEEE Energy 2030 is slated for 17-18 November at the Atlanta Marriott Marquis.

Sustainable energy meets the power needs of the present without depleting it for the future. Renewable energy sources such as solar, wind, nuclear, geothermal, hydro and biomass are typically included. Sustainable energy efforts usually entail technologies that improve energy efficiency.

Georgia Tech Professor Dr. Deepak Divan, conference chair and president-elect of the IEEE Power Electronics Society, said the strong interest the event has generated points to the need for a forum focusing on energy sustainability.

"The interdependencies of technology, resources, economics and policy no longer allow simpler models to work effectively, requiring a holistic approach to defining solutions," said Divan, director of Georgia Tech's Intelligent Power Infrastructure Consortium (IPIC).

Topics of discussion include reduced carbon generation; public policy for sustainability; smart grid and energy efficiency; demand management; plug-in hybrid electric vehicles; economics of sustainability; energy storage; power electronics; renewable energy; and distributed energy resources.

Speakers will include, among others, David Ratcliffe, chairman, president and CEO of Southern Company, one of America's largest electricity producers; Clark Gellings, vice president of technology, Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI); and Patricia Hoffman, principal deputy assistant secretary for the Department of Energy's Office of Electricity Delivery and Energy Reliability.

IEEE Energy 2030 was initiated and sponsored by the IEEE TAB New Technology Directions Committee. Sponsors include EPRI, Georgia Tech, Vestas, ABB, AWEA, INNOVOLT, IPIC, NEETRAC, SEI, Siemens, Southern Company, UTRC and UWIG.

IEEE co-sponsors are IEEE-USA, the IEEE Standards Association, IEEE Power Electronics Society and IEEE Power and Energy Society.

IEEE-USA advances the public good and promotes the careers and public policy interests of more than 215,000 engineers, scientists and allied professionals who are U.S. members of the IEEE. IEEE-USA is part of the IEEE, the world's largest technical professional society with 375,000 members in 160 countries. See http://www.ieeeusa.org.