Aaron Siskind

Abstract

When I met Aaron Siskind in his home in Pawtucket, a short, stocky figure slowly greeted me with an infectious smile. He was open and gracious about the interview—he did not mind the recorder and seemed very pleased by my interest in his life and work. Files, boxes and prints surrounded us in his dining room, all carefully labelled and organized. He was conscious, and proud, of his place in history. In conversation, he proved to be, at once, both prickly and charming, and his deep, rumbling laughter punctuated much of our conversation. He admitted to a faulty memory in 1989, his 86th year. But we talked for two hours and even then I was sorry to leave with so much more to discuss     

Up with wind

As wind power continues to be one of the fastest-growing energy sources worldwide, utility planners and operators must meet the challenge of integrating increasing levels of wind power into their electrical power systems. These challenges stem from the nondispatchable nature of wind power and can be broken down into components associated with variability (i.e., effects due to the changing wind resource) and uncertainty (i.e., effects related to our inability to perfectly forecast the weather). In the past, utilities were often motivated to conduct an integration study to determine the costs associated with integrating wind power into their systems; recently, however, there has been a move away from a simple determination of wind-integration costs and towards a balanced view of both integration costs and operational savings due to displaced fuel and emissions.