Solar Panels

Gov. Martin O'Malley and his wife, Katie, have put a "green" stamp on the governor's mansion since moving in three years ago. Next week, they will take environmentalism to a new level by installing solar panels on the roof. The panels, and other upgrades such as more efficient lighting and temperature controls, are part of a broader project to save energy at state-operated buildings. The solar array will provide about half of the hot water used by the mansion's residents, and will be installed inconspicuously to preserve the character of the 140-year-old historic mansion that is one of the most visible landmarks in Annapolis.

Astronauts successfully stitched together tears in a sheet of solar panels on the International Space Station early yesterday morning in a seven-hour operation that was one of the most difficult ever attempted in space. Spacewalker Scott E. Parazynski snipped a guide wire that had snagged on the long, wing-like solar array and another wire that had gotten tangled in the damaged area. He also laced five makeshift braces made of aluminum, wire and insulating tape - dubbed "cuff links" by the crew - into the panels to stabilize them.

It's back.NASA's Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous spacecraft, built in Maryland and launched toward the Asteroid Belt almost two years ago, is zooming back toward a close encounter with Earth early tomorrow morning.The $108 million, 1,800-pound NEAR is returning for an energy boost and a course change toward its ultimate target, the asteroid Eros.It will also take snapshots and movies of Earth and calibrate its instruments as it soars within 333 miles of its home planet.Along the way, NEAR will be maneuvered to reflect flashes of sunlight onto more than a dozen U.S. cities, giving millions of Americans a chance to see an interplanetary spacecraft as it zips around the solar system.

Why so many military planes are crashingWhile politicians and others seek the band-aids for the spate of accidents involving our military aircraft, the relationship between the Clinton administration's cutbacks over the last five budget years and the accidents is obvious to those of us who spent the bulk of our working lives involved with military aviation.One need only talk to the commanders and line pilots of any Air Force or Navy aviation unit to see the relationship.Experienced pilots of these potentially lethal aircraft are leaving the services in droves for lucrative jobs in commercial aviation, leaving more junior people to fill the void.

Laboratory results came in yesterday but didn't pinpoint what is making the water smell like rubbing alcohol at Carroll Springs School.All tests by a private lab in Baltimore were negative for the three substances that are suspected of causing the hot tap water in Rooms 9 and 12 to give off an odor since Jan. 23, said Vernon Smith, director of support services for the county schools.But officials still suspect three substances -- isopropanol, ethylene glycol and propylene glycol.The two glycols, especially, were suspected from the start because they are present inside solar panels at the school.

The guessing games are over at Carroll Springs School: A plumber has found not only the source of the rubbing-alcohol odor in the school's water, but also the cause.A valve that regulates the mixing of hot and cold water was leaking diethyl ether from a diaphragm that expands and contracts according to the water temperature. The valve was probably weakened by a hot water heater set too high, said Vernon Smith, director of support services for Carroll County schools."That was the source of the problem all along; it had nothing to do with the solar panels on top of the building," Mr. Smith said.

ABIQUIU, N.M. - At Christ in the Desert, a Benedictine monastery tucked between stark mesas, 24 monks follow the routine of prayer and labor that has sustained their order for 1,500 years.They clean, chop wood, weave, carve icons, bake bread and design sites on the Internet's World Wide Web."I can't think of better work for us to be doing," said Brother Mary-Aquinas, 30, a bespectacled monk in a brown hooded habit and hiking boots, who was once a systems analyst in Denver."This work goes back to the ancient tradition of the scribes, taking information and making it beautiful, into art," he said.

Maryland, says the Senate president, can't compete for jobs with other states because our economic development officials "are endeavoring to compete with their hands tied behind their ++ back."Good analogy. When it comes to big job announcements, Maryland is in the minor leagues. Virginia, South Carolina, Alabama, North Carolina, even Pennsylvania win the large plants.But is there an easy answer to Maryland's lackluster showing? That's what an 18-member legislative panel will try to discover.

The Hubble Space Telescope repair team concluded its fifth and final space walk today, a servicing stop dominated by the nuts and bolts of space mechanics and a little screw that almost got away.In slightly more than 7 hours and 21 minutes, astronauts F. Story Musgrave and Jeffrey A. Hoffman finished the last repairs on NASA's $1.6 billion telescope, packed up their tools and closed out the servicing end of the mission with yet another flawless, though taxing, performance.With Hubble's new tangerine-colored solar panels unfurled, Hubble was set to be returned to orbit tomorrow.

The Doctors Goodwrench repairing the Hubble Space Telescope tossed one of the spacecraft's faulty solar panels overboard last night and replaced it with a new one during the second of five planned spacewalks. The work followed a successful first day under the hood that secured the telescope's pointing ability.Astronauts Tom Akers, an Air Force lieutenant colonel, and Kathryn C. Thornton, like their two predecessors on the first spacewalk, left the shuttle Endeavour's cabin more than an hour ahead of schedule.

Visitors have traveled for miles to see David and Laura Sill's new garage in Reisterstown. What makes this three-car garage worth the trip is that it was made out of about 200 bales of straw and features a toilet that heats waste into environmentally friendly ash. The Sills' garage was finished last week, just in time to be part of the B-more, B-Green Solar Tour on Sunday sponsored by the American Solar Energy Society, Potomac Regional Solar Energy Association...

Katie Roberts' environmental ethic runs strong. She grew up on a farm, now works for an eco-conscious company and has renovated the inside of her Odenton home to conserve energy. But when she decided to add a rain barrel to an out-of-sight nook of her backyard, she had a problem: her community association. "The barrels are very attractive and they're the same color as my deck and would fit in aesthetically, but anything bigger than 2 feet is considered a statue," she said of the barrel, made locally from an old wooden wine cask.

Gov. Martin O'Malley and his wife, Katie, have put a "green" stamp on the governor's mansion since moving in three years ago. Next week, they will take environmentalism to a new level by installing solar panels on the roof. The panels, and other upgrades such as more efficient lighting and temperature controls, are part of a broader project to save energy at state-operated buildings. The solar array will provide about half of the hot water used by the mansion's residents, and will be installed inconspicuously to preserve the character of the 140-year-old historic mansion that is one of the most visible landmarks in Annapolis.

Marcelo da Luz's low-slung experimental solar car seemed far more stylish than even General Motors' iconic '59 Chevy gull-wing design as he accelerated around the parking lot of Forest Ridge Elementary in Howard County yesterday before several hundred admiring children. "It's like a race car. It's cool. It looks cool," exclaimed Dustin Windom, 11, a fifth-grader at the North Laurel school. "If you take off the wheels, it would look like a submarine," said Jesse Rocco, also 11. In fact, the native Brazilian told the kids and teachers that someone who had spotted him driving it in Alaska called 911 to report a UFO. The students emitted a chorus of "ohs" when da Luz got into the cockpit, lying nearly flat on his back, clicked his seat belts into place, donned communications gear and had one of his three crew members lower the car's fragile-looking skin over him. He took off briskly, driving three times around the parking lot before taking off for his next gig, on Capitol Hill.

Although County Council members and environmentalists encourage homeowners in Anne Arundel's critical areas and bogs to upgrade their septic tanks, the move won't be required after the council rejected a bill that would force homeowners in those areas to install nitrogen-reducing septic systems to improve the health of the Chesapeake Bay. Five of the council's seven members voted Monday against the bill - including one of the bill's co-sponsors, Ronald...

Susana Tregobov dries clothes on a line behind her Timonium townhouse, saving energy and money. But her homeowners association has ordered her to bring in the laundry. The crackdown came after a neighbor complained that the clothesline "makes our community look like Dundalk." Ms. Tregobov and her husband plan to fight for their right to a clothesline, but the odds are against them. Although Maryland recently passed a law protecting homeowners' rights to erect solar panels for generating electricity, it is still legal here for communities to ban solar clothes-drying.

The city of Annapolis has announced a pilot program aimed at providing residents and small-business owners with funding for affordable, energy-efficient improvements to their homes and shops. The Annapolis Energy Zone, or EZ, program - formed with the help of the Maryland Energy Administration, the Annapolis and Anne Arundel County Chamber of Commerce, and Commerce First Bank - will provide private funds to property owners interested in reducing the city's impact on the environment. "This will be a program that will allow the reduction of the carbon footprint and is one part of the city's overall program to increase energy efficiency," said City Administrator Bob Agee.

Retailers are typically obsessed with what to put under their roofs, not on them. Yet the nation's biggest store chains are coming to see their immense, flat roofs as an untapped resource. In recent months, chains including Wal-Mart Stores, Kohl's, Safeway and Whole Foods Market have installed solar panels on roofs of their stores to generate electricity on a large scale. One reason is that they are racing to beat a Dec. 31 deadline to gain tax advantages for these projects. So far, most chains have outfitted fewer than 10 percent of their stores.

A weathered gray barn on the property of the Howard County Conservancy is getting a modern makeover with the addition of solar panels that will provide energy and education opportunities for the nonprofit environmental education center. Twelve solar panels were donated by Richard Deutschmann, chief executive officer of Chesapeake Solar, a renewable energy company in Jessup. Deutschmann has strong ties to the conservancy: He and his wife, Vanessa, married there two years ago, and his son has participated in many programs on the 232-acre property.

I never thought I'd be a greenie," said retired Army Maj. Harold Bower. But this year, he shelled out about $31,000 -- before government incentives -- for two solar energy systems at his all-electric four-bedroom home in Severn. One provides all the hot water. The other, about 30 percent of the household electricity. He thinks of himself more as an investor in technology that allows him to gloat now about having electric bills no larger than those he had before the Baltimore Gas and Electric Co. rate increase.