Using Hydropower to Empower Sustainable Communities
Academy member Trey Taylor, co-founder and president of Verdant Power, believes that underwater turbines that convert flowing water into electricity augur the future of energy production.
Published May 1, 2007
By Adelle Caravanos
Academy Contributor
Trey Taylor is in the business of sharing ideas. The co-founder and president of Verdant Power, LLC, a sustainable energy company, has built a career around assessing market forces, bringing together the best and brightest minds in a field, and passionately working for a cause. Most recently, that cause has been renewable energy, in the form of hydropower.
Taylor’s eclectic and varied background gives new meaning to “more than the sum of its parts.” His knack for storytelling and talent for explaining complex ideas betray his years of studying history and political science at Portland State University and graduate work in urban education at the University of Minnesota.
But more than anything, it is Taylor’s skill at recognizing the needs of a market—and the means by which to fill them—that has propelled him through a successful career marketing for such large multinational corporations as Procter & Gamble, ITT Corporation, and British Telecom. Transitioning from marketing to advertising, Taylor became a master at networking while serving as director of advertising for some of the country’s largest trade associations: the American Council of Life Insurers, the Health Insurance Association of America, and the Edison Electric Institute (EEI).
A Hydropower Epiphany
While at EEI, the trade association of investor-owned utilities, Taylor began thinking about how new, computer-based technologies were creating an increased need for electricity. The deregulation of electrical utilities at that time meant no more power plants were likely to be built. This sparked his interest in renewable energy, and in discovering sources that hadn’t been tapped to the extent that they could be.
It was an “ah ha!” moment for Taylor. He says, “After realizing that more than a third of the world’s population didn’t have access to electricity, but lived near some form of moving water—one of the greatest untapped renewable energy sources in the world—I formed a company to commercialize technological concepts for converting kinetic hydropower to electricity.”
In 2000, Taylor co-founded Verdant Power and brought together a team of engineers and scientists to design turbines for placement in rivers and tidal estuaries where they could harness the power of flowing water. Unlike traditional hydropower technologies such as dams, underwater turbines which local communities can easily install. This was the case for Verdant’s first customer, New York City’s Roosevelt Island.
Exceeding Expectations
With support from various state and local groups, Verdant runs the Roosevelt Island Tidal Energy (RITE) project, which relies on a field of water turbines to convert the kinetic energy of the East River to electricity for the island.
In December 2002, the output of Verdant’s first turbine there exceeded expectations, producing an average power output of 14.5 kilowatts per hour. “That single turbine produced 8,000 kilowatt hours per month, delivered to a Gristedes supermarket,” Taylor says. “Now you start looking at the math: What if you had 300 turbines? It’s pretty cool!”
In early April, Verdant Power installed four additional turbines for Roosevelt Island that will provide electricity not only to the supermarket, but also to a parking garage, where hybrid electric buses will plug into tidal power. The company will conduct an 18-month environmental study of the turbines to gather empirical evidence demonstrating that the turbines are not harming fish that pass through the area. A concurrent operational test has several goals, two of which are to optimize the manufacturing of the next generation of turbines and to expand the Roosevelt Island field.
A Hybrid Renewable Future
Taylor is excited to expand Verdant’s work on the island, and eventually to other sites in the United States and around the world. He foresees hybrid renewable energy systems consisting of complementary uses of wind, solar and hydropower, along with fuel cells. “Therein lies the answer for the future of energy production in the world. We can start getting these systems right, and then integrating them in really cost-effective ways,” Taylor predicts.
Taylor now divides his time between Verdant Power’s offices on Roosevelt Island, Washington, DC, and Toronto. He and his team are exploring the installation of turbines in the Saint Lawrence River and are working with the Brazilian government to bring the technology to rural villages in the Amazon basin. Additionally, the company is looking into prototypes for use in man-made canals such as the 11,000 miles of irrigation channels in California.
The possibilities for new applications and hybrid integration are what fuel the company. But for Taylor, the picture is even bigger: “What I get excited about is the new thinking, not only among academicians but also other entrepreneurs. It’s the mass collaboration, open source energy, all these ideas come pouring in for applications and problem solving,” he says. “It’s a different way of looking at electric energy production than the old utility mind-think—the idea of powering and empowering sustainable communities.”
Also read: Sustainable Development for a Better Tomorrow
About the Author
Adelle Caravanos is a freelance science writer based in Queens, New York.
