INL researchers develop microgrids for diversity, reliability, resilience

INL researchers Kurt Myers, left, and Robert Turk inspect solar panels at Utah’s Dugway Proving Ground.

This is the age of sharing, so in hopes of driving traffic to the inl.gov Web site, I'm posting a link to an article I wrote that was posted today (yes, I wear many different hats.) It's about microgrids, renewable energy and the work that researchers at the lab are doing in those areas.

Having lived here for almost 34 years, it has been fascinating to watch the evolution of what was at the time called the INEL. In 1982, "the site" was about nuclear energy, the Navy, reactors, etc. The non-Navy work was done for essentially two clients, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the commercial nuclear power industry. Today, "the lab" is about nuclear energy, but also about such things as electric vehicles, microgrids, flow batteries, biomass conversion and cyber-security. Stories such as the one I'm sharing here are allowing me to wrap my head around the importance of what's really happening.

Anyway, here's the link:

MICROGRIDS CAN ENHANCE DIVERSITY, RELIABILITY, RESILIENCE

Kneaders plans opening by end of July

Kneaders, a Utah-­based chain popular with many eastern Idahoans, has plans to open in Sand Creek Commons by the end of July this year, according to papers filed last week at the Ammon Building Department office.

The building permit filed March 30 shows plans for building of 4,214 square feet, with a kitchen and serving area of 2,226 square feet and a seating area of 1,618 square feet. Occupancy for the entire restaurant is 143. The estimated completion date entered was July 31.

Kneaders dates back to 1997, when it was founded by Gary and Colleen Worthington. It specializes in European hearth breads made from scratch on site daily, as well as gourmet sandwiches, soups, salads, pastries and breakfast items. It also provides catering services for groups of all sizes, from birthday parties to weddings, and offers a variety of retail products including award-­winning gift baskets and holiday­-themed gifts.

So far, the company has 42 locations in Utah, Colorado, Arizona, Texas and Idaho, where it opened its first store in Meridian. Like many chains, there is a mix of franchise operations and company­owned stores. The Ammon restaurant will be company owned.

Eric Isom, chief development officer of Ball Ventures, the co­-developer of Sand Creek
Commons, said that when courting tenants for their projects they have sought a lot of input from locals. Because so many people travel from eastern Idaho to Utah, there has been a lot of interest in Kneaders. “It’s been one of the most common requests in the last two or three years,” he said.

EIRMC recognized as Level II Trauma Center

The State of Idaho has recognized Eastern Idaho Regional Medical Center as a Level II Trauma Center. The hospital had been working toward this goal for three years, and on Saturday it received a certificate recognizing its status.

"To be recognized as a trauma center you have to be either verified by the American College of Surgeons, which we have been since 2007, or state designated, which we recently became," said Brian O'Byrne, director of the trauma center.

A national verification as a Level II Trauma Center from the American College of Surgeons Committee on Trauma is considered to be the highest level of achievement for hospital-based programs.

Level II Trauma Centers provide patient with 24-hour immediate coverage by general surgeons, as well as coverage by the specialties of orthopedic surgery, neurosurgery, anesthesiology, emergency medicine, radiology and critical care.

In 2010, EIRMC's Emergency Department received the Qualis Health Award of Excellence in Healthcare Quality for its work in improving the quality of healthcare and patient safety. O'Byrne also said, they will be able to reach first responders in rural areas of Idaho.

"What we will be able to do in the future is use this system to designate smaller facilities throughout the state, especially rural Idaho."

In addition, EIRMC is home to Air Idaho Rescue (AIR), a mini-fleet with helicopter, a turboprop airplane, and ground transport capabilities. AIR is one of just 136 nationally accredited air emergency transport services in the U.S.

Looking Back | April 1, 2016

Note: Looking Back appears in the Post Register every Thursday.

100 years ago
The Carnegie Library at the corner of Elm Street and North Eastern Avenue opened its doors March 30, 1916.

The event was the culmination of a project that dated back to 1905, when some public-spirited women in the community, led by Mrs. A.L. Campbell of the Village Improvement Society and Mrs. Dymae Jones, president of the Round Table Club, began corresponding with Andrew Carnegie's representatives, eventually securing a $10,000 grant.

Members of the library board, Mayor George Edgington, members of the City Council, Miss Lowry, the librarian, and her assistants, Misses Orr and Brown, stood in a receiving line, shaking hands and receiving congratulations from nearly 2,000.

The building served as Idaho Falls' public library until the mid-1970s. It is now part of the Museum of Idaho.

75 years ago
Idaho Falls resident David Rathbun offered 80 acres of land he owned in Colorado to the federal government, in hopes that a bulwark against Nazi Germany might be built if needed.

Rathbun said the land was "a few counties away" from 9,000 acres the Third Reich had claimed upon the death of its German-American owner. "My land is within easy range of the big guns," Rathbun wrote in a letter to President Franklin Roosevelt. "It would be no worse for the United States government to take the property than it was for Hitler to take it," the letter said.

50 years ago
Fred Waring and The Pennsylvanians played to a sold-out Idaho Falls Civic Auditorium on March 31, 1966. Sponsored by the local Kiwanis Club, it was the ninth time the orchestra had come to Idaho Falls to play.

One of the highlights of the evening came before the final number of the show, when Kiwanis Club President Irv Hock and club member Fred Ochi presented Waring with a watercolor portrait Ochi had painted for the occasion.

25 years ago
Lynn Thomas of Dubois, his daughter, Lynette Rogers of Renton, Wash., and her two children, Nathan, 15, and Anna, 11, made a grisly discovery of human limbs in a cave near Dubois, on March 29, 1991. The family was exploring a cave near another cave that was still stocked with fallout shelter supplies.

The discovery was not entirely unexpected, as the explorers had been discussing a human torso found in the cave in August 1979. Clark County Sheriff Craig King said the limbs were probably the same person, but the case, most likely a homicide, would remain a mystery until a skull was found.

Early 2016 housing stats show Bonneville County rebound

Source: Snake River Multiple Listing Service

In the absence of anything earth-shattering along the lines of Costco, Dunkin’ Donuts or In-N-Out Burger, it’s always a good time to crunch some numbers in order to provide some news for the day.

A statistician I am not, but I do like looking at the housing market numbers from the Snake River Multiple Listing Service to see what is going on locally.

Today’s drill-down was to look at stats from January and February over the past 10 years. It’s typically not a great time of year for home sales, but what I found interesting was that the number of homes sold (259) was the highest since the first two months of 2007 (242). Things had been climbing back since 2012, but the 37.8 percent spike from 2015 to this year represented a development worth noticing.

If I were to guess at what might be driving this, I would point to Fluor Idaho, which is taking over the Idaho Cleanup Project at the beginning of June and has opened a new office on Lindsay Boulevard.

The other thing to note is that the median price has bounced back. In the first two months of 2007 it was $146,700 and in 2016 it was $149,000, up sharply from 2015.

This tracks pretty closely with the Federal Housing Finance Agency’s HPI Calculator, a tool I never get tired of using. A home bought for $146,000 in the last quarter of 2006 would have an estimated value of $147,161 in the last quarter of 2015. All in all, housing prices seem to be back where they were before they peaked in 2008 then tanked.

If you bought a home in the Idaho Falls Metropolitan Statistical Area for $146,000 at the end of 2006 this is the line chart for the estimated value through Q4 2015. (Source Federal Housing Finance Agency)