But it doesn't stop at these two defenses

"The biggest renewable resource is the sun," said Lynn Orr, who has been namedoverall director of the new institute, which will function as an independentlaboratory reporting to the dean of research. "But we need to lower the cost ofconverting sunlight into electricity and supplying it through a much improvedelectric grid. The new center will allow us to expand significantly our effortto develop new nanostructured materials for solar energy and energy storage andto work on the host of social, market and policy issues involved in the neededtransition to energy systems with significant fractions of renewables." Orr is a professor in energy resources engineering. He has been the director ofStanfords Global Climate and Energy Project (GCEP), where researchers areinvolved in more than 40 research projects to find ways to reduce greenhouse gasemissions associated with energy. GCEPs research portfolio includes the scienceof materials used to convert solar energy to electricity, biomass energyconversions, advanced batteries, fuel cells, advanced combustion, and carboncapture and storage. The Precourt Institute for Energy will be housed in the Jerry Yang and AkikoYamazaki Environment and Energy Building, commonly known as Y2E2, a structurethat showcases green construction. "It uses about half the energy of a typicalStanford lab building and 90 percent less water," Orr said.

The Precourtresearchers will share the building with Stanfords Woods Institute for theEnvironment, a campus-wide hub for interdisciplinary research, education andaction on the environment and sustainability. The big question-how to provide for energy needs while protecting the planet-isjust the sort challenge that Stanford "should attack with all the intellectualhorsepower we can muster," Orr said. Seed funding to push forward research into new ideas will be available."Stanford faculty and students are brimming with ideas that, with some initialsupport, can be brought to the point that external support can be obtained," Orrsaid. On the main campus, the multidisciplinary effort will involve faculty fromEngineering, Earth Sciences, and Humanities and Sciences, along with the Programon Energy and Sustainable Development in the Freeman Spogli Institute forInternational Studies. Researchers from the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory will join in, as well,through the Stanford Institute for Materials and Energy Science, a collaborationbetween Stanford and the U.S Department of Energy. Seven or eight new faculty positions will be created, as well as fellowships toattract the brightest graduate students and postdoctoral scholars from aroundthe world.

Hennessy announced the founding of the new institute at a gathering inStanfords Memorial Auditorium. The announcement was followed by an energydiscussion that included noted venture capitalist John Doerr, a partner atKleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers; Google CEO Eric Schmidt; Jane Woodward,president of MAP, a private firm focused on royalty interests from natural gasand renewable energy; Jim Sweeney, director of the Precourt Center for EnergyEfficiency; and Sally Benson, director of GCEP. RELEVANT URL: PRECOURT CENTER FOR ENERGY EFFICIENCY CLIMATE AND ENERGY PROJECT BUILDING News ServiceDan Stober, COMMENT:Lynn Orr, 650-725-6270 or 650-723-8435Energy Resources Engineeringdirector of the Precourt Institute for Copyright Business Wire 2009. It all starts with two bad games of lazy tackling and facing two elite running backs, and then all of a sudden the Houston Texans have one of the worst rundefenses in the league.But for the entire seasonSomething I've beennoticing lately, and luckily some of my opponents in fantasy haven't, is that owners get far too caught up in defense rankings and match-ups, without actually taking a close look for themselves .The trouble is, if you hear that the Tennessee Titans defense is "horrible" in Week Six, you're bound to start any quarterback against them, no questions asked, from that point on.But this philosophy doesn't work.The Houston run defense got better. It got much better.The Tennessee Titans got Cortland Finnegan back and played more controlled offensive football with Vince Young in the line-up, and now their pass defense is, you guessed it, better .But it doesn't stop at these two defenses. Here are two more 2009 Urban NFLLegends that were begotten early in the season and are still living in the minds of many. The Arizona Cardinals Pass Defense StinksYeah, it can But take this week for instance. They're facing Matt Hasselbeck and a Seattle Seahawks offense that they destroyed four weeks ago, 27-3.