Eric Bastow - East Coast Technical Support

I'd like to introduce another member of the Indium Solar Team. Although the west coast enjoys most of the solar activity, Eric Bastow (East Coast Solar support) values the importance of the east:

[Eric B.]  Living in upstate New York, just a few hours south of the Canadian border, with the Great Lakes not far to the west and the Atlantic Ocean not far to the east, with something like 200 cloudy days a year and "10 months of winter and 2 months of bad skiing", it is almost hard to imagine that capturing the sun's energy would ever be a worth while approach to supplying our energy needs, at least in this part of the world.

The western United States seem to have the dominant position in the domestic solar industry but we should not forget that the East Coast is a "power house" as well (no pun intended). We should be mindful of the fact that the East Coast is home to "The Sunshine State", Florida. Anybody that reads solar industry related news will know full well that there is no lack of solar activity in Florida. It should also be noted that Florida residents have captured the suns energy for years through roof mounted panels. Swimming pool water is pumped from the pool up into the blackened panels on the roof, capturing the sun's warming energy, before sending it back to the pool. There are also certain East Coast universities such as UNC at Charlotte that offer programs specific to solar energy.

I may live on the East Coast in a somewhat cold dreary part of it, but there are other places in the East that are forging ahead into this industry.

The West may be strong but there are no British Empires in the solar industry. "The Sun Never Set on the British Empire….."

Authored by previous Indium Application Manager Jim Hisert