Basic Info

Physics and Math of Sustainable Energy: Official Course Description

In this course students will learn content and skills so that they can participate effectively in sustainable energy projects, make personal and community decisions that reduce carbon emissions, and work in ventures in sustainable energy. Additionally, this course will be useful for those interested in energy and climate policy, either internationally or domestically. We will begin with a quick overview of current CO2 emissions levels and look at how this is related to energy use. We will then turn our attention to basic ideas from physics, including the definition of energy and the difference between energy and power. The bulk of the course will consist of a survey of different forms of energy consumption and generation. Throughout, we will quantitatively analyze technology from both a local and global point of view. For example, we will calculate how much electricity one can generate on a rooftop, and we will also examine the role that solar PV could play toward the goal of eliminating fossil fuel use worldwide. In a unit on financial mathematics, students will learn about the time value of money and several ways of quantifying investments, including ROI (return on investment) and IRR (internal rate of return). Students will apply these financial tools in several short case studies. If time permits, we may also cover negative emissions technologies and the electrical grid, including grid stability issues and the potential of smart-grid technology. Meets the following degree requirements: QR ES

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Who/when/where

• Instructor: Dave Feldman
• Pronouns: he/him/his
• Meeting Times: Tuesday + Friday, 10:35 - 12:00. Labs Friday 1:00 - 2:35 or 2:35 - 4:00
• Location: Room 103, Center for Human Ecology
• Help Sessions: Help Session Schedule (updated frequently)
• Individual Meetings: By appointment
• Tutors: Autumn Hopple

Axioms

In mathematics, axioms are propositions that are assumed to be true. The mathematician Federico Ardila-Mantilla has written four axioms that guide the work he does in education and outreach. Federico's axioms resonate strongly with me. They are (slightly re-written to apply to physics as well as math):

1. Mathematical and physics potential is distributed equally among different groups, irrespective of geographic, demographic, and economic boundaries.
2. Everyone can have joyful, meaningful, and empowering math and physics experiences.
3. Math and physics are powerful, malleable tools that can be shaped and used differently by various communities to serve their needs.
4. Every student deserves to be treated with dignity and respect.

Community Agreement

Taking the above axioms as a starting point, let's think about what type of community we want to create this term. Here is a community agreement based on one written by Federico Ardila-Mantilla.

This course aims to offer a joyful, meaningful, and empowering experience to every participant; we will build that rich experience together by devoting our strongest available effort to the class. You will be challenged and supported. Please be prepared to take an active, critical, patient, creative, and generous role in your own learning and that of your classmates.

More Course Info and Advice

Structure and Pacing

This is my fifteenth time teaching this course, so I have a pretty good sense of how it will go. This class has several, overlapping parts:

1. During the first 1-2 weeks of the class we'll spend some time building community.
2. The first 1-4(ish) weeks we'll cover some core material and build up some skills. We'll cycle back to to key ideas frequently. This course is about building quantitative and analytical skills, and the only way to do this is through lots of practice. Weeks two-four may be a little challenging as you get your feet under you and (re)develop some skills.
3. The last half of the class you'll have a solid base of skills and so the mechanics of the homework will likely go more smoothly, while the physics and climate implications of what we cover will get more and more interesting.
4. At some point toward the middle of the course we'll take a little detour and learn some financial mathematics. You will likely find this more interesting than you think you're going to find it. Really.

There are two lab sections for the course. You should attend one lab session each week. Please attend the same lab each week if possible, but if not, it's not a big deal.

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Stuff about Homework

1. There will be an assignment due almost every Friday. It is essential that you do these assignments, as this is how one learns math, and also this is most of what your evaluation will be based on.
2. There will be two parts to almost every homework assignment:
   • Problems to be submitted on WeBWorK
   • Problems to be submitted on "paper" (a scanned pdf) on google classroom
3. WeBWorK is an online homework system. There are three reasons why I use WeBWorK:
   • You get instant feedback while doing the work, so you can learn right away from your mistakes. You can submit solutions many times until you get everything correct.
   • Some problems are randomized so that you will all get slightly different versions of the questions. This means that collaborating with other students will be maximally effective, since you'll have to share solution methods and not just the final answer.
   • Since the problems are automatically marked, I can spend more time helping you and won't have to spend as much time grading.
4. If you need extra time for one or two of the homework assignments, it's not a big deal. But be mindful to not fall farther behind every week.
5. I do not expect all of the homework assignments to be easy; I don't expect you to be able to sit down and do them easily the first time. Don't let yourself get frustrated. I strongly suggest working with others and seeking help if you need it.
6. You are strongly encouraged to work together on homework. You can also consult me, class tutors, other faculty, friends, and family. However, the homework you hand in should represent your own understanding.
7. As I plan on sending out homework assignments and other information via email/google classroom, it is important that you check your email/classroom regularly.
8. You will want to have at your disposal a scientific calculator or phone/tablet app. I strongly suggest an actual calculator. You do not need a graphing calculator for this course (or, in my opinion, ever).

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What this Class Isn't

1. This course is not about the following things, although this course should help you do/think about the following things better and more richly.
   • Energy policy
   • Social impacts of energy technologies
   • Environmental impacts of energy technologies
   • Weatherproofing your house
   • Building your own wind turbine
   • Climate change and global warming
   • A physics class
2. There may be a temptation to delve too deep into particular technology to the point that we're swamped with facts and details. There is also a temptation to get bogged down in discussions about policy, ethics, and justice. We should collectively resist these temptations; there are a lot of important topics to learn about.
3. Many of the examples in this class are based on a US context. I will incorporate other contexts as I can, and will try to make clear differences between the US and elsewhere in terms of energy.

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Help Sessions

The Teaching Assistant and I will have a handful of help sessions every week. You are warmly invited and encouraged to attend these sessions. Help sessions are relaxed, informal, and hopefully fun. Things that happen at help sessions:

1. The TAs and/or I am around to offer help on the homework.
2. Some students do most of the homework while at a help session. They work through problems alone or with others, and find it comforting to know that help is immediately at hand if needed.
3. Others do the problems at home and come to the help session with specific questions.
4. Some students work in groups at help sessions, others work more or less alone.
5. Help sessions are also a chance to ask general questions about the course. Conversations also sometimes wander into other areas: politics, the state of the world, what's for dinner, what classes are offered next term, and so on.
6. Help sessions are a great way to meet other students in the class.
7. Often there will be coffee/tea and/or snacks.

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Individual Meetings

I am happy to meet with students one-on-one. The best way to set up an appointment is to send an email. There are lots of reasons why you might want to meet with me:

1. You have some in-depth questions that there isn't time to explore in a help session.
2. You have a question that you think is too basic or you're uncomfortable asking in a help session. (You shouldn't be uncomfortable, since, as the saying goes, there are no dumb questions! But I understand that you might be uncomfortable nevertheless.)
3. You want to explore possibilities for energy projects on campus or in the community.
4. You want to discuss some challenges you're facing in the class.
5. You want to talk about other classes in energy or physics, or internships, senior projects, etc.

Please don't hesitate to reach out if there's anything you want to discuss. You should also feel free to reach out to the TAs.

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What your Evaluation is Based on

Your evaluation will be based on your performance on homework assignments (approx 90%) and your contributions in lab sections (approx 10%). There will be weekly homework assignments and, towards the end of the course, some mini-case studies and projects. I think there is much to be said against grades; I believe they often interfere with genuine, reflective learning. But I am happy to assign grades if you wish. I do not have any quota of A's, B's, etc.

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Artificial "Intelligence"

"We create all these machines, and we become beholden to them. Not because the machines have a will of their own, but because we do not."

Matt Scherer on the Dreaming Against the Machine podcast with Adam Becker paraphrasing John Dewey writing in The Public and Its Problems.

Artificial "intelligence" is a term that is used in many ways to refer to many different things. In what follows, when I say "AI", I am referring to the use of large language model (LLM) chatbots like chatGPT, Claude, co-pilot, and so on.

Thoughts, musings, guidelines, maybe even some rules

• I think it is a mistake to think of AI as New, Revolutionary, unlike Anything We've Ever Seen Before. Much of the language we use to describe "AI" serves the interests of the owners of LLMs and the cluster of ideologies that they seek to impose. ("Intelligence", "agents", "going rogue", "thinking/knowing/understanding", etc.)
• There are aspects of LLMs that are definitely new, but I think there is a lot to be learned by viewing them as yet another technological product.
• The goal of this class is for you to learn some skills and knowledge which will help you engage critically with with issues of energy and sustainability. The idea is you will learn, and that this will change you and help develop new ways of thinking and navigating the world.
• AI is most likely an impediment to your learning. If you use it for work in this class, you are almost surely short-circuiting your learning process.
• I like going to the gym to lift weights. Gaining and maintaining strength is important as one ages, and I have some back and hip arthritis that will be less debilitating as I age if I stay strong. There are machines that I could use to pick up and put down weights for me. That would be easier! But the point of lifting weights isn't to lift weights, it's to change my body and my mind. I think using AI as a learning tool is similar to using a machine to lift weights for you.
• This analogy works for almost anything you are trying to learn. You wouldn't take a navigation class and then just use google maps. You wouldn't take a poetry class and use AI to write poetry. You wouldn't take a drawing class and just photocopy other people's drawings. You wouldn't take a cooking class and then just go by pre-made food at Hannaford. And so on.
• Thalia Wheatley refers to LLM chatbots as a sort of junk food. She says this in the context of conversations in reference to AI "friends" and "therapists". Just like a big mac has been engineered to give one pleasurable feelings of satiety without providing nutrition, LLM chatbots can provide the satisfying dopamine hit one gets from a conversation without any of the other cognitive and social benefits. (note to self: add link to Thalia's summer 2026 talk.)
• I fear the same thing could be true for attempts to learn with LLMs. Learning can be super satisfying and fun. Using a LLM can feel like learning and could be fun, but is unlikely to be actual learning. (This is true not just of LLMs. There are all sorts of technological and non-technological ways to trick ourselves into thinking we're learning.) There aren't really any shortcuts to learning. There are different paths, and it's not one-size-fits-all, but I think there's no way to avoid the journey.

Rules (sorta)

• Whatever work you submit must should be your own understanding. This means that you could explain the reasoning and justification behind any ideas, calculations, results, and so on. (This has always been true, well before the advent of LLMs.)
• If you submit work that is not generated by you, you must indicate that clearly. Failure to do so is dishonesty.
• For written reports (these will come later in the term), you must do, yourself, all stages of writing. I.e., you many not use LLMs to write for you.
• If you feel tempted to use LLMs because you are worried about your grade, that is an indication that I haven't designed the class right, and we should talk. I think a lot of reason why there is an epidemic of AI "cheating" in high schools and colleges (not necessarily at COA) is because of the unnecessary pressure of grades and the transactional nature of education.

My use of AI

• I will never use AI to evaluate your work or to communicate to you.
• I will not use AI to produce materials for this class.
• Two exceptions to the above:
  • In some cases I may use an LLM to help proofread or copy-edit a piece or writing. (I am a little dyslexic. I find proofreading on a screen difficult, especially when I am tired. My proofreading ability is not getting better as I age.)
  • In some cases I may use an LLM as a sort of enhanced search, using it to point me to reliable references but not relying on the output of the LLM itself.
  • In some cases I may use an LLM to query to brainstorm ideas. For example, I might ask it for some ways to explain a topic to beginner. When I've done that, almost always I think the answers aren't good, and I get annoyed, and that helps me come up with better ways of explaining things or funner more engaging class activities.

  Are there acceptable uses for AI

  Yes. Definitely. I think it's best to not view the individual use of AI as a moral issue, and give space for different people to engage with it differently at different times. I am not saying that we should be uncritical toward AI! At all. I just think individual guilt likely isn't useful.

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  Diversity, Inclusion, and Belonging

  It is my intent that students from all backgrounds and perspectives be well served by this course, that students' learning needs be addressed both in and out of class, and that the diversity that students bring to this class be viewed as a resource, strength, and benefit. I aim to present materials and activities that are respectful of diversity: gender, sexuality, disability, age, religion, socioeconomic status, ethnicity, race, and culture.

  Learning about diverse perspectives and identities is an ongoing process. I am always looking to learn more about power and privilege and the harmful effects of racism, sexism, homophobia, classism, and other forms of discrimination and oppression. Your suggestions are encouraged and appreciated. Please let me know ways to improve the effectiveness of the course for you personally, or for other students or student groups. If something was said or done in class (by anyone, including me) that made you feel uncomfortable, please let me know. You can also reach out to: Provost Kourtney Collum; Puranjot Kaur, Coordinator of the Office of Title IX and Civil Rights Compliance; or Maya Caines, Restorative Practices Team Coordinator.

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  Gender-based discrimination: Title IX

  COA is committed to fostering a safe, respectful, and inclusive campus where all community members have equal access to education and employment. We will not tolerate sexual harassment or gender-based discrimination of any kind.

  As a faculty member, I am considered a "Responsible Employee." This means I am required to share any disclosures of sexual or gender-based misconduct with the Title IX Coordinator—even if the incident occurred before your time at COA. The purpose of this requirement is to ensure that anyone who has experienced sexual misconduct is offered support, information about their rights, and access to available resources. Please know that you are not required to respond to outreach, and a disclosure does not automatically result in a report to law enforcement.

  For more information about Title IX, COA’s policies, and available resources, please visit: coa.edu/human-resources/title-ix.

  If you would like to ask questions or explore support options, you are encouraged to contact COA's Title IX Coordinator, Puranjot Kaur, at pkaur@coa.edu. Speaking with the Title IX Coordinator does not automatically initiate a college resolution process. Much of her work focuses on providing supportive measures to help you continue to fully participate in COA's programs and activities.

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  Statements about Academic Honesty and Hours of Academic Engagement

  • I am required to remind you that: "By enrolling in an academic institution, a student is subscribing to common standards of academic honesty. Any cheating, plagiarism, falsifying or fabricating of data is a breach of such standards. A student must make it his or her responsibility to not use words or works of others without proper acknowledgment. Plagiarism is unacceptable and evidence of such activity is reported to the academic dean or his/her designee. Two violations of academic integrity are grounds for dismissal from the college. Students should request in-class discussions of such questions when complex issues of ethical scholarship arise."
  • I am also required to say that: You should expect to spend 150 hours of academically engaged time on this course, or 15 hours per week. In addition to 4.5 hours per week in class or discussion section, in a typical week you will spend 2 hours reading and preparing for class and 8.5 hours attending help sessions and completing assignments.

Schedule

Important Links

Week 00

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Week 01

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Week 02

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Week 03

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Week 04

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Week 05

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Week 06

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Week 07

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Week 08

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Week 09

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Week 10

The building in which we gather for this class, and all of College of the Atlantic, is located on traditional lands of the Wabanaki people. The four Native American tribes in Maine today are the Maliseet, Micmac, Penobscot, and Passamaquoddy, collectively referred to as the Wabanaki. Although largely a technical class, we will touch upon questions of energy colonialism and imperialism. I believe it is important to acknowledge that our presence on this land entangles us in the web of colonialism, past and present. The future, however, is still unwritten.

In this class we will learn about non-fossil fuel sources of energy. Transitioning to a fossil fuel free society is essential to avoid catastrophic climate change. College of the Atlantic, and by extention all of us, historically and presently benefit from energy provided by inexpensive fossil fuel sources. Again, we are entangled with the system that we seek to replace.