Basis missing for Mesa County as an “Epicenter for Energy Innovation”

I was surprised to learn that “energy innovation epicenter” not only made the list as a goal in Mesa County’s draft economic development plan, but that it is at the very top of the list.

Why? There are many reasons, but the most obvious starting point seems to be with the US Dept. of Energy Office of Science’s 56-page report “Science for our Nation’s Energy Future: Energy Frontier Research Centers (EFRC)” published only last month that identifies the 46 EFRC’s and their 115 partners (comprised mostly of research universities) located in 35 states across the nation –- with Federal funding of $2-$5 million already committed per center per year for each of the 46 EFRC’s. These 46 EFRC’s were identified back in 2009 and are comprised of research universities, national laboratories, nonprofit organizations, and private industry.

Colorado has one of the EFRC’s, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory in Golden, and two of the partner institutions, University of Colorado Boulder and Colorado State University Fort Collins. We are an innovative community, that goes without saying, and I’m a staunch advocate of big progressive ideas, and I certainly recognize the importance of a little risk-taking (as all of you who read and supported Grand Valley Magazine in print know), but those ideas and calculated risks should at least have some basis in sound research and potential viability. (And even then, as with GV Magazine, there are no guarantees.)

The research and development taking place across the EFRC’s and partners range from advanced solar energy, nanotechnology, high-intensity light sources, neutron scattering sources, biofuels, transportation, energy efficiency, electricity storage and transmission, carbon capture and sequestration, and nuclear energy. Most of these advanced technologies have been in research and development by the 46 EFRC’s and their 115 partner institutions for decades, which means they are already well established as “energy innovation epicenters.” I am eager to learn how our leadership expects to compete in this particular innovation arena. Just because we have energy natural resources in Western Colorado, does not mean we are innovating with those resources in a way that justifies the investment it would take to truly make the map, so to speak –- certainly not when compared to those established EFRC’s and partners.

The only thing I can think of that might cause our community’s economic development leadership to pose such a gargantuan goal of Mesa County as an “energy innovation epicenter” is perhaps they have some secret insight about it as a potential opportunity that the rest of us –- including the US Dept. of Energy – are completely clueless about.

Further, since Mesa State College President Tim Foster has made it quite clear that Colorado Mesa University will not be positioned or marketed as a research university, then what or who will serve as the nucleus of the proposed epicenter? “We are a teaching university that does some research, not a research university,” he said.

The County’s Economic Development Partners, comprised of 20 local organizations , drafted the plan with input from local businesses. I can’t help but wonder if any serious research was done prior to drafting the plan, or if the plan is based merely on opinion surveys. Or perhaps, the partners truly are holding to some secret revolutionary energy innovation that will prompt an entire mid-stream redirect of the nation’s energy innovation priorities. I am hoping that is the case!

There is a public meeting this Wednesday, June 29 from 7:30-9:30 a.m. at Mesa State College/Colorado Mesa University ballroom of the college center to discuss “thoughts and ideas as we all work together toward this goal,” according to Grand Junction Economic Partnership interim director Kelly Marlin in her article in Sunday’s (6-26-11) Daily Sentinel. I can only assume they will either announce the big revolutionary innovation secret, or reveal how they plan to raise the millions of dollars needed each year to fund it, as well as the specific energy innovation priority they have in mind. No matter what, this forum should prove quite interesting indeed!

To learn more, visit:

http://www.nrel.gov/
http://science.energy.gov/bes/efrc/

Where is our hometown grocer?

I read in the Sunday (5-29-2011) Daily Sentinel Biz Buzz column –- with much dismay, about Kroger’s decision to replace Grand Junction-based Flying Fish Sushi with Los Angeles-based Fuji Foods in 14 of its City Market stores in Western Colorado, costing Flying Fish and our community more than 20 jobs.

What wasn’t mentioned in Biz Buzz is that Flying Fish is one of nearly 30 local companies’ products cut or on the block to be cut from City Markets in Western Colorado within the past year. This is more than sad. (But don’t worry, our sacred Palisade Peaches and Olathe Sweet Corn are in far too high demand beyond our local markets to get the Kroger axe. Yep, famous all the way to Cincinnati, whew, thank goodness.)

With the final phases of corporate consolidation to Kroger’s Cincinnati headquarters, the local Grand Junction and regional Denver City Market administrative offices continue to phase-out staff without replacements -- familiar names and faces who have been engaged in the community for 30 years and more.

Local nonprofits must now submit their community support requests not to the local City Market office, but to the Kroger HQ in Cincinnati. Cincinnati, as in Ohio, the state, way over there. And Grand Valley Magazine, by the way, would have to sign on with the national distributor in order to remain in the 16 stores we are cleared to sell in. A move that is cost-prohibitive for a small regional magazine.

Maybe the Kroger folks forgot that City Market was started in the Grand Valley. Many of its long-time employees hired personally by Joe Prinster, who built on his father’s small grocery business expanding the brand into a regional network of hometown City Market stores across Western Colorado; stores that sought out local products primarily because It just makes sense.

As a business owner, I can certainly understand the need to be efficient and profitable, while meeting growing customer demand. I get that. And perhaps they’re right in Cincinnati that when it comes down to it most consumers really don’t care where their goods and produce come from as long as they are cheap and uniform.

There may be a lot of people who feel that way -- for whatever reason, and that's their business. But there are also a lot who do care. As I read on in the Biz Buzz, alone at the kitchen table with a now soggy bowl of cereal, I cheered out loud that Community Hospital, Fisher's Market and Premium Natural Meats, Wild West Steaks and Seafood, Albertsons, and Family Food Town have all contracted with Flying Fish to make sushi for them.

That's local business supporting local business. That's collaboration; that's economic development in action; that's how its done in Western Colorado.

I am so looking forward to our local farmers markets opening -- this year, more than ever it seems. Hope to see you there!

The last issue of GV Magazine

Not a day has gone by in the past few weeks that someone hasn't said to me about one thing or another, "Yep, I'm taking things to the next level." Interesting how that phrase can mean so many different things to so many different people, but essentially what all their "next levels" do have in common is that they are levels involving changes: in their businesses, their educational pursuits, their lives.

Since launching our first issue 32 months ago, we have continued to expand not only the magazine's readership and advertising partnerships, but a growing client project base through our custom publishing division as well. GV Custom Publishing Company's products and services include high-quality specialty publications, market research, and campaign design. The growing demand for magazine-style coverage in a multi-media format as well as for GV Custom products and services has presented the company with some unique opportunities that can only be communicated at this time as, "Yep, it's time to take things to the next level."

The mission of the GV brand to celebrate the dynamic life, landscape, and people of the greater Grand Valley is made possible because of everyone who shares that same love of Western Colorado. And it is clearly time to take that celebration to the next level, from simply recognizing that there is so much to celebrate each and every day -- something we can all certainly do -- to GV Custom Publishing Company creating new specialty media that incorporate new technologies in ever-evolving ways.

On behalf of the entire GV family, I thank you for your support, partnership, and encouragement, but most of all for your friendship. We look forward to seeing you on the trail.

Those frivolous nonessential arts

Ever wonder why the arts are the first to see their funding cut during unstable times? Ever wonder where the idea that arts are “nonessential services” comes from? I used to wonder that too.

The movie The Sound of Music had a profound effect on me as a child. I was too young certainly to understand its climate of politics and war and all that (I was only five or six), but what did take hold of me was the undeniable power of music as a survival tool. For all their position and resources, none of which could save them from certain doom, it was music that allowed the big dysfunctional family and the singing governess to escape to the pretty mountains. And the fact that the bad guys in the movie never sang a single note was not lost on me either.

As I got older, I learned of numerous events, both ancient and contemporary, where music and the arts changed the course of history. I concluded that China’s cultural revolution, only a few generations past, for example, was about suppressing and controlling the arts — to make way for more essential “social” services as promised under a then-new Communist regime.

I’d forgotten about The Sound of Music and childhood memories of its cinematic detail. Forgotten, that is, until more than 20 years later, when I happened to land in Estonia on the heels of its “Singing Revolution,” an organized event in defiance of the USSR’s long-contested occupation of the small Baltic nation. Armed only with their voices and their songs, the determined Estonians won their independence — an event that marked the official beginning of the end of the USSR. Oh sure, the end of the USSR was inevitable, but Estonia's "Singing Revolution" served as the the opening ceremony.

Although rich with artistic license, The Sound of Music is based on the story of a real family. The Estonians really did press their independence with a “Singing Revolution.” Music, singing — all the arts — have power to change a community or an entire nation. Even if state and federal funding are diminished, the creative power of a people will flourish and thrive.

When Winston Churchill was asked to cut arts funding in favor of the war effort, he simply replied "Then what are we fighting for?"

Krystyn Hartman