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Nepal’s capital Kathmandu is one of the most polluted cities in the world. But its also one of the fastest-growing markets for EVs: Nepals electric cars now outsell new fossil-fueled vehicles. In the U.S., around 9% of new cars sold last year were electric. In Nepal, that number was around 65%. Theres been a really remarkable transformation in the uptake of electric vehicles, says David Sislen, the World Bank country director for Nepal, Maldives, and Sri Lanka. Only five years ago, EVs made up a tiny fraction of new car sales in Nepal. Three-wheeled mini-buses, a popular vehicle in the country, were also mostly gas. For those vehicles now, the adoption rate went from less than 1% to 83%, Sislen says. There was one main reason for the change. So many public policy challenges are complicated and nuanced and hard to understand, but this one is the opposite, he says. Its incredibly simple. In July of 2021, the government radically dropped the import duties and excise taxes on electric vehicles. You make it cheaper, and suddenly people will adopt them. (The country has recently slightly increased taxes on EVs, likely because it was missing the revenue. But electric vehicles are still a better bargain.) After someone owns an EV, its also cheaper to operate than a gas or diesel vehicle. Thats true anywhere, but especially in Nepal, where fuel is imported and expensive. Charging an EV could be a tenth of the cost of refueling another vehicle, or even less. The models that are availablefrom companies like Chinas BYD and Indias Tataare also desirable. (Tesla also recently started selling cars in Nepal, though Chinese alternatives are more affordable and arguably even better-performing.) “You see electric vehicles every day, all day long,” says Sislen. “It feels like it’s half of what’s on the road. And the number of [electric] dealerships is amazing.” Nepal was an early adopter of electric three-wheeled vehicles, known locally as tempos. The first wave of hundreds of electric tempos, funded by USAID and manufactured locally, rolled out in the Kathmandu Valley in the 1990s. But by the turn of the century, government policy helped kill the early industry by cutting import taxes on gas microbuses. Now, modern electric tempos are quickly growing again. Charging can still be a challenge, though charging infrastructure is also quickly growing, along with alternatives like battery swapping. We want to deploy technology to make the entire journey seamless, says Deepak Raunier, an entrepreneur who is working on a network of battery-swapping stations for two-wheeler and three-wheeler EVs throughout the region. Kathmandu is also beginning to roll out a fleet of larger electric buses. Last year, Satja Yayatat, a coop bus service that serves the city, added 40 new electric buses and a large new charging station, and it now plans to add another 100. The buses cost around 33 times less to charge than fueling a bus with diesel, although the upfront cost is higher. The charging essentially runs on clean electricity, since most of the country’s energy comes from hydropower. “That makes this even more impactfulyou’re not charging your vehicles with coal-fired power,” says Sislen. “You’re charging them with green energy.” Nepal’s climate goals under the Paris agreement include getting to 90% adoption of EVs for private four-wheeled vehicles by 2030. Though with just 0.027% of global emissions, climate isn’t the biggest reason for the country to actinstead, it’s air pollution. Kathmandu’s geography, surrounded by mountains, traps pollutants. Climate change is leading to more drought in the winter, meaning less rain to help clear the air. Pollution comes from a variety of sources, including wildfires (also increasing because of climate change), and outdated boilers at factories, which the World Bank is pushing to help replace. But transportation is another key factor. And with fewer vehicles belching black exhaust on roads in Kathmandu, the city will be a healthier place to live.
Category:
E-Commerce
For decades, the one-on-one meeting has been a sacred ritual of managerial life. Its the office equivalent of a treadmill session: repetitive, well-intentioned, and mostly endured out of guilt. Conventional wisdom says every manager should have regular 1:1s with their direct reports to build trust, boost engagement, and drive performance. However, as work evolveswith a faster pace, flatter structures, hybrid and asynchronous communication, AI tools that manage tasks more efficiently than most humans ever willits worth asking: Do we still need all these 1:1s? A Brief History In the early 20th century, Frederick Taylor’s influential Scientific Management (1911) introduced the idea of optimizing work through detailed observation and individual instruction. While strictly not 1:1 meetings in a modern sense, this era laid the groundwork for formal manager-employee check-ins, focused almost exclusively on productivity and control. Similarly, military hierarchies institutionalized briefings and debriefingsstructured one-on-one conversations that inspired corporate management systems, especially during and after WWII. Think of it as command-and-control performance reviews, with little space for career development or psychological safety. After WWII, workplace psychology gained prominence. The famous Hawthorne Studies showed that individual attention improved morale and productivity. This era birthed the “manager as coach” concept, which has recently reemerged in the form of Herminia Ibarras leader as coach. In 1960, Douglas McGregor’s Theory Y reframed employees as intrinsically motivated individuals rather than passive workers. In this context, 1:1 meetings began to evolve into opportunities for feedback, mentorship, and development, especially in management training programs pioneered by companies like GE, IBM, and Procter & Gamble. With the decline of manufacturing and the rise of the knowledge economy, especially in tech and consulting, the nature of workand therefore managementchanged. As workers were paid more for thinking than doing, interpersonal communication became a management imperative. By the early 1980s, books like Andy Groves High Output Management popularized 1:1s as tools for alignment, coaching, and decision-making. Grove, the legendary Intel CEO, explicitly advocated for weekly 1:1s as a way to catch small issues before they became large ones, and to ensure both parties shared the same context. His model influenced Silicon Valley and remains widely cited in tech. Meetings Without Meaning Steven G. Rogelberg, an organizational psychologist and author of Glad We Met: The Art and Science of 1:1 Meetings, compellingly illustrates that while 1:1s can be powerful tools for enhancing employee engagement and satisfaction, they often become counterproductive and misused. Rogelberg identifies several common pitfalls that can render 1:1 meetings ineffective: Manager-Dominated Conversations: When managers monopolize the discussion, speaking more than they listen, or focus solely on task lists, it undermines the meeting’s purpose. Rogelberg notes that such practices serve the manager’s needs rather than supporting the employee’s development. Lack of Personal Engagement: Effective 1:1s should address both tactical and personal aspects of an employee’s role. Neglecting the personal dimension can lead to missed opportunities for deeper connection and support. Over-Frequency Leading to Micromanagement: Holding these meetings too often can make employees feel micromanaged. Rogelberg suggests a biweekly cadence of 25 to 50 minutes to balance oversight with autonomy Productivity Tax Too often, 1:1s are where status updates are mumbled, calendars are synced, and passive-aggressive comments are politely ignored. They are, in short, a productivity tax, one which alas is often not properly quantified or accounted for. Harvard Business Schools Ashley Whillans reckons the typical knowledge worker spends over 20 hours a week on meetings. The problem is not the 1:1 itself. Its how, why, and how often its done. Managers cling to weekly 1:1s out of habit or guilt, not strategy. In some orgs, these meetings are confused with therapy; in others, with micromanagement. And worse still, many managers show up to 1:1s with no agenda, no questions, and no curiositya surefire way to destroy psychological safety. As a matter of fact, most 1:1s are ineffective. Recent research suggests that 70% of meetings hinder employees from completing their tasks, leading to decreased productivity. Despite a 20% reduction in average meeting length during the pandemic, the number of meetings attended by workers increased by 13.5%, exacerbating the issue. To be sure, not all 1:1s are created equal. In fact, one of the biggest mistakes leaders make is treating all 1:1s the same. Effective managers treat 1:1s like tools in a leadership tool kitused with intention, tailored to the task. Importantly, good management is not about treating everyone the same, but as they deserve and would like be treated. In that sense, it would be foolish to assume that everyone is equally interested in 1:1 meetings, or benefits from the same kind or type of meetings. Why AI Makes 1:1s Redundant In an age where Slack pings, shared docs, performance dashboards, and real-time feedback tools bombard us with continuous signals, the weekly or biweekly 1:1 starts to feel like a nostalgic ritualless essential leadership practice, more management cosplay. The workplace has become asynchronous, distributed, and data-rich. Managers can monitor performance in real-time through productivity aalytics. Employee sentiment can be gauged with pulse surveys and engagement tools. Peer feedback, 360 reviews, personality assessments, and even mood indicators from collaboration software give you more insight than a 30-minute Zoom ever could. And unlike human memory, these systems dont forget, distort, or sugarcoat. Even the emotional dimension of 1:1sthe human check-inis being digitized. AI tools like Microsoft Copilot or Reclaim.ai can summarize conversations, flag coaching opportunities, and recommend follow-ups before youve even had your morning coffee. Platforms can infer burnout risk from calendar density or written tone. Want to know who feels neglected or disengaged? Ask the algorithm, not your gut. The very technologies designed to enhance 1:1s are replacing the need for them. Just as calculators made mental math optional, AI makes manual managerial check-ins look like horse-drawn meetings in an era of hyperloops. Less ritual, more relevance That doesnt mean we dont need feedback, coaching, or empathy. But it does mean the format of the traditional 1:1calendarized, synchronous, performativemay be overdue for rethinking. In a world of always-on data and generative simulations, the manager who insists on a standing weekly check-in may look less diligent and more . . . analog. So, what replaces them? Perhaps a mosaic of micro-interactions, data-driven nudges, and intentional (not habitual) human moments. In other words, less ritual, more relevance. As generative AI matures and avatars become indistinguishable from their human counterparts, we may not need to show up to 1:1s at all. Instead, well delegate them to our digital twinshyperrealistic, fine-tuned, emotion-simulating versions of ourselves, trained on our past performance reviews, Slack tone, and leadership competencies. Imagine logging into Zoom and seeing your bosss AI twin nodding empathetically at your AI twin, while both exchange perfectly polite updates and preapproved feedback. The meeting ends, the logs are summarized, and the human versions skim the transcripts over lunch, ideally while doing something more usefullike actual work. This isnt as far-fetched as it sounds. Companies like Synthesia and Soul Machines are already building digital avatars that can hold unscripted conversations. Microsoft and Meta are investing in personal AI agents that will schedule, negotiate, and even attend meetings on your behalf. In a world of 60% scheduling excess and skyrocketing manager-to-report ratios, letting your digital clone handle routine 1:1s might feel less dystopian and more like time management. The only question is: when both participants are AI, will the meeting be more productiveor just faster at getting nowhere? Requiem for the 1:1 The one-on-one meeting, once a cornerstone of modern management, now teeters on the edge of obsolescencea charming relic from an analog era, repurposed but rarely rethought. What began as a well-intended vehicle for alignment, coaching, and connection has too often devolved into a managerial placebo: comforting, habitual, and questionably effective. The demands of todays workplacefaster, flatter, and far more fluidsimply dont align with the lumbering cadence of standing check-ins. In a world where performance is visible in real-time, where emotional states are algorithmically inferred, and where digital twins can carry out conversations better than most middle managers, the weekly 1:1 risks becoming the corporate equivalent of sending a faxquaint, unnecessary, and performed mostly by those resistant to better alternatives. This doesnt mean we should abandon human connection or stop developing talent. It means rethinking how and when its best delivered. Great managers will still check inbut with intention, not obligation. Theyll coach, not calendar. And the smartest ones will know when to step aside and let technology take the busywork out of empathy. The future of leadership may still (hopefully) be personalbut it wont always be synchronous, sentimental, or stuck in a recurring Zoom slot.
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E-Commerce
When Spencer Rascoff took over as CEO at the struggling dating app giant Match Group in February, one of his first orders of business was to acquaint himself with all the services under his purview. Match, which owns and operates more that 45 dating apps, including Tinder, Hinge, OKCupid, and Match.com, has seen its stock price drop more than 80% from its 2021 high amid growing fatigue with online dating and a generation shift away from apps. After explosive growth during the pandemic, Matchs annual revenue has been flattening, in large part because growth at Tinder, its once-reliable cash cow, has stalled. Rascoff, the cofounder and former CEO of Zillow Group, is tasked with turning things around. Rascoff asked the leadership of Tinder and Hinge to each take three hours and present their apps to him. The Tinder team began by walking him through the apps financial results and business metrics. They then got to the product road map, and finally to the people and culture. The team behind Hingewhich grew revenue by 39% last year, providing a rare bright spot in the Match Group portfoliotook an entirely different approach. They started with consumer insights. This is where Gen Z is at. This is where Millennials are at. This is the zeitgeist of the world. This is what they want. This is how they date. This is how they think. This is how they connect, Rascoff recalled in May, as he told the story to the audience at the JPMorgan Global Technology, Media, and Communications Conference. Only at the very end, did they actually share, briefly, revenue and financial metrics. Rascoffs conclusion: If you want to understand why Hinge is winning and Tinder was losing, thats it. Thats why. A little more than a week later, Tinder CEO Faye Iosotaluno announced that she would step down in July, after less than two years in the role. Rascoff is taking the reins himself. Match shares rose 1.3% following the announcement. Tinder, which accounts for more than half of Match Groups revenue, has had a difficult run. It grew revenue only 1% last year and has been shedding users: Its lost more than 1.2 million paying subscribers since the start of 2024. (When Match Group reported its Q1 earnings in May, it also announced it was laying off 13% of its workforce.) Tinders not alone: In January, rival dating app Bumble announced that founder Whitney Wolfe Herd would return as CEO, replacing Lidiane Jones, who had been in the role for all of a year. In 2024, Bumble app grew its paying users by 11% to 2.8 million. But in the first quarter of this year, its revenue decreased 6.5% year over year, to $201.8 million, and it shed nearly 100,000 paying users since the end of 2024. Meanwhile, the average revenue per user has dropped 15% since 2021. Bumble has signaled in earnings that it has had difficulty retaining younger users, particularly Gen Z. Its stock is down more than 40%, year over year, and off 90% from its post-IPO high in 2021. (Match and Bumble both declined to make executives available for interviews for this story.) Rascoff and Wolfe Herd are now embarking on ambitious turnaround plans that have them rethinking what users want from Tinder and Bumbleand how the dating apps underlying user experiences can deliver it. This generation doesnt want more matches. They want better ones, Rascoff said in a recent Instagram post. And though their target audiences may be different, its a lesson both can learn from Match Groups emerging darling, Hinge. Hinging on connection Led by CEO and founder Justin McLeod, Hinge launched in 2012the same year as Tinder and two years ahead of Bumble. But while Tinder became a pop-culture staple, thanks to its addictive swipe-right UX, Hinge remained fairly under-the-radar. Its motto is designed to be deleted, and McLeod has focused on creating a user experience that optimizes for lasting connections. Customers logging off the app for good rather than swiping forever is considered a success. That ethos is paying off. In 2024, Hinge took in $550 million in revenue, driven by a 23% rise in paying users. In October, it leap-frogged over Bumble to become the second most downloaded dating app in the U.S. for the first time ever (Tinder retained its no. 1 status). To guide this kind of user behavior, Hinge has deployed a counterintuitive product strategy. Most apps try to reduce friction to make the user experience easy and addictive: Think of the simplicity and elegance of swiping through unlimited options on Tinder, without any pressure to message potential matches. In September, Hinge bucked that trend and deliberately inserted a stumbling block for users with a feature called Your Turn Limits. The feature solves one of the biggest challenges users face when trying to secure a date: unanswered messages from people who ghost their matches. Now, Hinge users with too many unanswered messages are required to send a reply or end the conversation before being allowed to connect with other users. Our north star metric is whether users are getting out on great dates or not, McLeod told Fast Company in an interview in February. After Your Turn Limits was released, the app saw fewer matches and likes, but more people going on dates. There are all of these kinds of techniques that can be really engaging and keep people sending lots of likes, but don’t necessarily lead to more dates, McLeod explained. So we do things differently. Hinge has a longer sign-up process than Tinder and Bumble. It asks users to submit at least six photos and answer a minimum of three prompts. On Tinder, users simply fill out basic information like their name, birthday, and sexual orientation, and add at least one photo; Bumbles sign-up process is similar. Hinge also takes a different approach to its premium offerings than Tinder. Tinders premium tiers focus on giving users access to more swipes or a profile boost to put them in front of more people, which helps with engagement but doesnt necessarily lead to quality matches. Hinges premium subscriptions have similar features but they also prioritize optimizing for better matches. Premium subscribers are able to filter profiles for characteristics like political affiliation, education level, family plans, or whether someone smokes. Subscribers can also get enhanced recommendations, where the apps algorithm surfaces profiles based on users recent activity. Perhaps taking inspiration from Hinges playbook, Tinder recently started letting users filter profiles by height. The new rules of dating Rascoff and Wolfe Herd diagnose the problems with Tinder and Bumble differently, but the result is the same: a decline in quality of matches. In interviews and earnings calls, Rascoff has said that Tinder suffers, first and foremost, from a perception problem as a hookup appa message that doesnt resonate with Gen Z users. Instead, he wants to help Gen Z users create casual, spontaneous connections without the pressure of hooking up. Were aiming to introduce new ways to meet new people in lower-pressure environments. Thats really what Gen Z wants. Rascoff said at the Wall Street Journals Future of Everything conference in late May. He signaled that even the apps core usr experiencethe profile swipecan be problematic. The high-pressure kind of product offering of looking at a photo and judging it, that is cringey for a lot of Gen Z people, he said. It makes them feel bad about themselves to look at photo and say thumbs up, thumbs down. (Rascoff went even further, writing on Instagram last week that The next era of dating wont be built on swipes alone, but he has since edited that line out of his post.) To create more casual dating experiences, Tinder is testing a new Double Date feature that allows users to pair up with a friend and swipe on other pairs of friendsand ultimately go on group dates. Currently available in Europe and rolling out in the U.S. later this year, the feature appeals to younger users: On Matchs Q1 earnings call, Rascoff reported that nearly 90% of Double Date users are under 29 years old. The feature is also helping the company grow its user base, as users invite friends to join (or reactivate) the app to take part in Double Date. Just as Hinge incorporates speed bumps in its user experience, forcing users to send messages to prospects before getting more swipes, Tinder also seems to be experimenting with adding a bit more friction into its own UX. To encourage good behavior on the app, the company recently introduced Are You Sure?, a feature that asks users to reconsider sending a message if it contains anything that could be considered distasteful. Rascoff has also announced plans to attract younger users by focusing less on making money from them through premium subscriptions. He told the crowd at the J.P. Morgan conference in May to think about Tinder as a bar for singles to meet. We’ve had two or three years of declining attendance at our bar. And the solution, to date, has been to increase the price of the drinks at the bar, and then occasionally come up with slightly different drinks or maybe sell food to an ever decreasing number of people at the bar. We must increase the number of people at the bar. According to Wolfe Herd, Bumbles problem isnt a lack of people at the barin some ways, its the opposite. During Bumbles Q1 earnings call, she noted that the company pulled in a lot of new users during the pandemic, but we now know they werent always the right fit, which led to fewer and lower-quality matches on the platform. As match quality dropped, some members got discouraged, found fewer successful matches and dates, and fewer people recommended the app to others, she said. The solution for Bumble is simple: Showing members people they want to see, getting them quality matches, quality chats, and closer to love. She has said that the company is pausing its efforts around monetization and growth marketing to instead focus on improving its matching algorithm and driving user engagement ahead of an app update this summer. And although she hasnt revealed too many specifics around how the app will change, she used her Q1 earnings call to highlight the importance of helping users create better profiles, giving them dating coaches to assist them through the process, and refining the apps ability to anticipate quality matches. She also signaled that its less about what new products Bumble will launch. We want you to see great people in great simple ways, efficient ways, but this is not about more features. Instead, the metrics that matter here are the quality of the engagement that people have on our product. In other words, shes orienting the app towards a north star that sounds very similar to Hinges. Incorporating AI Hinges recommendations algorithm has been a big draw for users. While Tinder relies heavily on a users location, age preferences, and swiping behavior to surface a users profile, Hinge generates matches primarily based on how a user answers prompts. Once it detects a pattern in the profiles a user is drawn to, it shows them more of that type of user towards you. In March, Hinge tweaked its algorithm to give users more targeted AI-powered recommendations. That update led to a 15% increase in matches and contact exchanges according to Match Groups Q1 earnings. We really have an understanding of your inclination to like someone and their inclination to like you back. We have more and more information about you and we have more information about your taste and your preferences, we can much more strongly predict that match, Mcleod told Fast Company, explaining that the more time a user spends on the app, the better the algorithm gets to know them. Now, Tinder and Bumble seem to be following its lead. Introducing himself to investors on Match Groups Q4 earnings call, Rascoff stressed that AI can help with user engagement and retention on dating apps, just as it has for social media apps like TikTok and Snapchat. Tinder is currently rolling out a Hinge-like AI-powered matching, which generates more personalized connections based on user data and activity in select markets. Meanwhile, in a May interview with The New York Times, Wolfe Herd said that she wants to use AI to make Bumble the worlds smartest matchmaker over the next two years. The AI can now select the best people and start showing the best people the best people and start getting you to a match quicker, more efficiently, more thoughtfully, she said. All three apps are also harnessing AI to help users optimize their profiles to get better matches. On Hinge and Tinder, if a user says they are afraid of snakes, for example, an AI prompt might counsel them to write a couple of sentences about why to make their profile more engaging. Wolfe Herd has said that the company plans on introducing a coaching hub, powered by humans and AI, that will help users improve their profiles and dating skills. In a somewhat bleak turn, Tinder is using AI to teach users how to behave on dates. Rascoff also mentioned a voice-based AI coach that Tinder rolled out for the month of April in Matchs Q1 earnings call. [It] let users practice flirting with an artificial intelligence date to learn to break the ice through humor, storytelling, and playful interaction. Ultimately though, Bumble and Tinders success may hinge on whether or not theyre able to incorporate Hinges secret sauce into their apps: features that attract high quality, intentional users who engage with the app and find a great match. To a large extent, the companies need to go back to their original strategies, before monetization and a growth at all costs mindset ruined their user experiences. As Wolfe Herd said in Bumbles latest earnings call, There has been this mindset that has been pervasive in the dating industry that more features equal better outcomes. And let’s just launch something new. But some of the greatest consumer products have not changed all that much in the last decade if you think about it.
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E-Commerce
After nearly a decade of planning and consultation, the San Francisco Unified School District has made its first venture into the unexpectedand increasingly relevantbusiness of affordable housing development. The district just opened Shirley Chisholm Village, a 135-unit housing complex in San Francisco’s oceanside Sunset District. Built on district-owned land, with affordable rents and preference given to SFUSD educators, it’s a model for the ways urban school districts can use their extensive land holdings to address the housing-affordability challenges faced by their own employees. The $105 million project was developed by the nonprofit MidPen Housing with a design by San Francisco-based BAR Architects & Interiors, in coordination with the San Francisco Mayor’s Office of Housing and Community Development. The units, set aside for residents who earn between 30% and 100% of the area’s median income, range from studios up to three-bedroom apartments. Other school districts have taken similar approaches, including the Los Angeles Unified School District, which began developing underutilized district-owned sites into housing back in 2009. SFUSD’s first foray into housing development stands out for both its design and the process behind it. [Photo: Bruce Damonte/courtesy BAR Architects & Interiors] The design of the building and its range of amenities were influenced directly by the preferences of the district’s teachers. A panel of educators helped guide the decade-long planning process to bring about the project, participating in workshops to shape its amenities and social spaces. “One of the main things that came out of those workshops was the desire to have a space to work when they came home, but not to work from their apartment,” says architect Patricia Centeno, a principal at BAR Architects & Interiors. The architects carved out a space on the five-story building’s top floor, facing the ocean, for a work-from-home lounge and gathering space. [Photo: Bruce Damonte/courtesy BAR Architects & Interiors] Other input from educators guided the way the project interfaces with the surrounding community, which is primarily made up of modest single-family homes. Dropping a 135-unit building in the middle of the neighborhood could have been a shock, but the designers worked to ensure the building and its site were not an imposition. [Photo: Bruce Damonte/courtesy BAR Architects & Interiors] It was a tricky balance to strike, because not long ago the site was a wide-open asphalt parking lot with a small, underutilized storage building, and the community had turned the parking lot into a makeshift neighborhood park. Nearly an acre and a half, it was used for basketball, skateboarding, and a range of other recreational activities. Replacing that with housingespecially housing that was at least a story or two taller than everything around itcould have been grounds for a vocal opposition campaign. The architects focused on making sure the project’s footprint was as small as possible. “One of our goals was to try to find a way to incorporate a portion of [the community park],” says Centeno. “We knew we were never going to be able to create something as extensive as what they had, but we worked with our client to see if we could meet the goal for the total number of units, and also create some sort of common public space.” [Photo: Bruce Damonte/courtesy BAR Architects & Interiors] What they came up with is a publicly accessible plaza, playground, and seating area placed in a carve-out along one of the project’s street-facing edges. “It’s a little bit of a return to the neighborhood,” says Chris Haegglund, president and CEO of BAR Architects & Interiors. A small one-story annex building that sits nearby is intended to be leased out to a local nonprofit. These spaces, and several residents-only common areas, were made possible by creatively shaping the building into an elongate H as seen from above, filling in the voids with courtyards and green space. [Photo: Bruce Damonte/courtesy BAR Architects & Interiors] From the street level, the building was designed to blend into the low-slung neighborhood as much as possible, despite rising to four and five stories in various places. Haegglund says the structure was stepped down at its edges to make a smoother transition to the smaller homes on either side. This nod to the context is also a geographical reference, evoking the sand dunes that once made up this section of San Francisco before development. “We’re trying to create a building that feels contemporary,” says Centeno. “But we’re trying to fit into a neighborhood of homes that were largely built in the 30s, 40s, and 50s, which is kind of newer by San Francisco standards.” [Photo: Bruce Damonte/courtesy BAR Architects & Interiors] To give the building that contemporary feel, the architects put an undulation into the roofline, having it mimic rolling dunes and referencing the roofs of the nearby houses. This undulation was also added to the facade of the building in a nod to the bay windows common in the region. Though the project was not required to include parking under the city’s zoning code, the developers chose to include some underground spaces, partly to assuage neighborhood concerns about street parking and partly at the request of the educators who helped guide the design process. Despite ample public transportation in much of San Francisco, this neighborhood is on the fringes, and some were concerned about potentially long commutes to schools in other parts of town. As a district-owned site, it does have the benefit of being embedded in its neighborhood, which makes its conversion to housingand the conversion of other district-owned sitesvery logical. And Shirley Chisholm Village is just the start. SFUSD has three other housing projects in the works.
Category:
E-Commerce
About 33 miles south of Phoenix, Interstate 10 bisects a line of solar panels traversing the desert like an iridescent snake. The solar farms shape follows the path of a canal, with panels serving as awnings to shade the gently flowing water from the unforgiving heat and wind of the Sonoran Desert. The panels began generating power last November for the Akimel Ootham and Pee Posh tribesknown together as the Gila River Indian Community, or GRICon their reservation in south-central Arizona, and they are the first of their kind in the U.S. The community is studying the effects of these panels on the water in the canal, hopeful that they will protect a precious resource from the deserts unflinching sun and wind. In September, GRIC is planning to break ground on another experimental effort to conserve water while generating electricity: floating solar. Between its canal canopies and the new project that would float photovoltaic panels on a reservoir it is building, GRIC hopes to one day power all of its canal and irrigation operations with solar electricity, transforming itself into one of the most innovative and closely-watched water users in the West in the process. The Gila River Indian Community in Arizona lined 3,000 feet of canals with solar panels. [Photo: Jake Bolster/Inside Climate News] The communitys investments come at a critical time for the Colorado River, which supplies water to about 40 million people across seven Western states, Mexico, and 30 tribes, including GRIC. Annual consumption from the river regularly exceeds its supply, and a decades-long drought, fueled in part by climate change, continues to leave water levels at Lake Powell and Lake Mead dangerously low. Covering water with solar panels is not a new idea. But for some it represents an elegant mitigation of water shortages in the West. Doing so could reduce evaporation, generate more carbon-free electricity, and require dams to run less frequently to produce power. But so far the technology has not been included in the ongoing Colorado River negotiations between the Upper Basin states of Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming, the Lower Basin states of Arizona, California, and Nevada, tribes, and Mexico. All are expected to eventually agree on cuts to the systems water allocations to maintain the rivers ability to provide water and electricity for residents and farms, and keep its ecosystem alive. People in the U.S. dont know about [floating solar] yet, said Scott Young, a former policy analyst in the Nevada state legislatures counsel bureau. Theyre not willing to look at it and try and factor it into the negotiations. Several Western water managers Inside Climate News contacted for this story said they were open to learning more about floating solarColorado has even studied the technology through pilot projects. But, outside of GRICs project, none knew of any plans to deploy floating solar anywhere in the basin. Some listed costly and unusual construction methods and potentially modest water savings as the primary obstacles to floating solar maturing in the U.S. A Tantalizing Technology With Tradeoffs A winery in Napa County, California, deployed the first floating solar panels in the U.S. on an irrigation pond in 2007. The country was still years away from passing federal legislation to combat the climate crisis, and the technology matured here haltingly. As recently as 2022, according to a Bloomberg analysis, most of the worlds 13 gigawatts of floating solar capacity had been built in Asia. Unlike many Asian countries, the U.S. has an abundance of undeveloped land where solar could be constructed, said Prateek Joshi, a research engineer at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) who has studied floating solar, among other forms of energy. Even though [floating solar] may play a smaller role, I think its a critical role in just diversifying our energy mix and also reducing the burden of land use, he said. [Image: Paul Horn/Inside Climate News] This February, NREL published a study that found floating solar on the reservoirs behind federally owned dams could provide enough electricity to power 100 million U.S. homes annually, but only if all the developable space on each reservoir were used. Lake Powell could host almost 15 gigawatts of floating solar using about 23% of its surface area, and Lake Mead could generate over 17 gigawatts of power on 28% of its surface. Such large-scale development is probably not going to be the case, Joshi said, but even if a project used only a fraction of the developable area, theres a lot of power you could get from a relatively small percentage of these Colorado Basin reservoirs. The study did not measure how much water evaporation floating solar would prevent, but previous NREL research has shown that photovoltaic panelssometimes called floatovoltaics when they are deployed on reservoirscould also save water by changing the way hydropower is deployed. Some of a dams energy could come from solar panels floating on its reservoir to prevent water from being released solely to generate electricity. As late as December, when a typical Western dam would be running low, lakes with floating solar could still have enough water to produce hydropower, reducing reliance on more expensive backup energy from gas-fired power plants. Joshi has spoken with developers and water managers about floating solar before, and said there is an eagerness to get this [technology] going. The technology, however, is not flawless. Solar arras can be around 20% more expensive to install on water than land, largely because of the added cost of buoys that keep the panels afloat, according to a 2021 NREL report. The waters cooling effect can boost panel efficiency, but floating solar panels may produce slightly less energy than a similarly sized array on land because they cant be tilted as directly toward the sun as land-based panels. And while the panels likely reduce water loss from reservoirs, they may also increase a water bodys emissions of greenhouse gases, which in turn warm the climate and increase evaporation. This January, researchers at Cornell University found that floating solar covering more than 70% of a ponds surface area increased the waters CO2 and methane emissions. These kinds of impacts should be considered not only for the waterbody in which [floating solar] is deployed but also in the broader context of trade-offs of shifting energy production from land to water, the studys authors wrote. Any energy technology has its trade-offs, Joshi said, and in the case of floating solar, some of its benefitsreduced evaporation and land usemay not be easy to express in dollars and cents. Silver Buckshot There is perhaps no bigger champion for floating solar in the West than Scott Young. Before he retired in 2016, he spent much of his 18 years working for the Nevada Legislature researching the effects of proposed legislation, especially in the energy sector. On an overcast, blustery May day in southwest Wyoming near his home, Young said that in the past two years he has promoted the technology to Colorado River negotiators, members of Congress, environmental groups, and other water managers from the seven basin states, all of whom he has implored to consider the virtues of floating solar arrays on Lake Powell and Lake Mead. Young grew up in the San Francisco Bay area, about 40 miles, he estimated, from the pioneering floating solar panels in Napa. He stressed that he does not have any ties to industry; he is just a concerned Westerner who wants to diversify the regions energy mix and save as much water as possible. But so far, when he has been able to get someones attention, Young said his pitch has been met with tepid interest. Usually the response is: Eh, thats kind of interesting, said Young, dressed in a black jacket, a maroon button-down shirt and a matching ball cap that framed his round, open face. But theres no follow-up. The Bureau of Reclamation has not received any formal proposals for floating solar on its reservoirs, said an agency spokesperson, who added that the bureau has been monitoring the technology. In a 2021 paper published with NREL, Reclamation estimated that floating solar on its reservoirs could generate approximately 1.5 terawatts of electricity, enough to power about 100 million homes. But, in addition to potentially interfering with recreation, aquatic life, and water safety, floating solars effect on evaporation proved difficult to model broadly. So many environmental factors determine how water is lost or consumed in a reservoirsolar intensity, wind, humidity, lake circulation, water depth, and temperaturethat the studys authors concluded Reclamation should be wary of contractors claims of evaporation savings without site-specific studies. Those same factors affect the panels efficiency, and in turn, how much hydropower would need to be generated from the reservoir they cover. The report also showed the Colorado River was ripe with floating solar potentialmore than any other basin in the West. Thats particularly true in the Upper Basin, where Young has been heartened by Colorados approach to the technology. In 2023, the state passed a law requiring several agencies to study the use of floating solar. Last December, the Colorado Water Conservation Board published its findings, and estimated that the state could save up to 407,000 acre-feet of water by deploying floating solar on certain reservoirs. An acre-foot covers one acre with a foot of water, or 325,851 gallons, just about three years worth of water for a family of four. When Young saw the Colorado study quantifying savings from floating solar, he felt hopeful. 407,000 acre-feet from one state, he said. I was hoping that would catch peoples attention. Saving that much water would require using more than 100,000 acres of surface water, said Cole Bedford, the Colorado Water Conservation Boards chief operating officer, in an email. On some of these reservoirs a [floating solar] system would diminish the recreational value such that it would not be appropriate, he said. On others, recreation, power generation, and water savings could be balanced. Colorado is not planning to develop another project in the wake of this study, and Bedford said that the technology is not a silver bullet solution for Colorado River negotiations. While floating solar is one tool in the tool kit for water conservation, the only true solution to the challenges facing the Colorado River Basin is a shift to supply-driven, sustainable uses and operations, he said. Some of the Wests largest and driest cities, like Phoenix and Denver, ferry Colorado River water to residents hundreds of miles away from the basin using a web of infrastructure that must reliably operate in unforgiving terrain. Like their counterparts at the state level, water managers in these cities have heard floatovoltaics floated before, but they say the technology is currently too immature and costly to be deployed in the U.S. Lake Pleasant, which holds some of the Central Arizona Projects Colorado River water, is also a popular recreation space, complicating its floating solar potential. [Photo: Jake Bolster/Inside Climate News] In Arizona, the Central Arizona Project (CAP) delivers much of the Colorado River water used by Phoenix, Tucson, tribes, and other southern Arizona communities with a 336-mile canal running through the desert, and Lake Pleasant, the companys 811,784-acre-foot reservoir. Though CAP is following GRICs deployment of solar over canals, it has no immediate plans to build solar over its canal, or Lake Pleasant, according to Darrin Francom, CAPs assistant general manager for operations, power, engineering, and maintenance, in part because the city of Peoria technically owns the surface water. Covering the whole canal with solar to save the 4,000 acre-feet that evaporates from it cold be prohibitively expensive for CAP. The dollar cost per that acre-foot [saved] is going to be in the tens of, you know, maybe even hundreds of thousands of dollars, Francom said, mainly due to working with novel equipment and construction methods. Ultimately, he continued, those costs are going to be borne by our ratepayers, which gives CAP reason to pursue other lower-cost ways to save water, like conservation programs, or to seek new sources. An intake tower moves water into and out of the dam at Lake Pleasant. [Photo: Jake Bolster/Inside Climate News] The increased costs associated with building solar panels on water instead of on land has made such projects unpalatable to Denver Water, Colorados largest water utility, which moves water out of the Colorado River Basin and through the Rocky Mountains to customers on the Front Range. Floating solar doesnt pencil out for us for many reasons, said Todd Hartman, a company spokesperson. Were we to add more solar resourceswhich we are consideringwe have abundant land-based options. GRIC spent about $5.6 million, financed with Inflation Reduction Act grants, to construct 3,000 feet of solar over a canal, according to David DeJong, project director for the communitys irrigation district. Young is aware there is no single solution to the problems plaguing the Colorado River Basin, and he knows floating solar is not a perfect technology. Instead, he thinks of it as a silver buckshot, he said, borrowing a term from John Entsminger, general manager for the Southern Nevada Water Authoritya technology that can be deployed alongside a constellation of behavioral changes to help keep the Colorado River alive. Given the duration and intensity of the drought in the West and the growing demand for water and clean energy, Young believes the U.S. needs to act now to embed this technology into the fabric of Western water management going forward. As drought in the West intensifies, I think more lawmakers are going to look at this, he said. If you can save water in two wayswhy not? Were Not Going to Know Until We Try If all goes according to plan, GRICs West Side Reservoir will be finished and ready to store Colorado River water by the end of July. The community wants to cover just under 60% of the lakes surface area with floating solar. Do we know for a fact that this is going to be 100% effective and foolproof? No, said DeJong, GRICs project director for its irrigation district. But were not going to know until we try. GRICs panels will have a few things going for them that projects on lakes Mead or Powell probably wouldnt. West Side Reservoir will not be open to recreation, limiting the panels impacts on people. And the community already has the fundsInflation Reduction Act grants and some of its own moneyto pay for the project. But GRICs solar ambitions may be threatened by the hostile posture toward solar and wind energy from the White House and congressional Republicans, and the project is vulnerable to an increasingly volatile economy. Since retaking office, President Donald Trump, aided by billionaire Elon Musk, has made deep cuts in renewable energy grants at the Environmental Protection Agency. It is unclear whether or to what extent the Bureau of Reclamation has slashed its grant programs. Under President Donald J. Trumps leadership, the department is working to cut bureaucratic waste and ensure taxpayer dollars are spent efficiently, said a spokesperson for the Department of the Interior, which oversees Reclamation. This includes ensuring Bureau of Reclamation projects that use funds from the Infrastructure Investments and Jobs Act and the Inflation Reduction Act align with administration priorities. Projects are being individually assessed by period of performance, criticality, and other criteria. Projects have been approved for obligation under this process so that critical work can continue. And Trumps tariffs could cause costs to balloon beyond the communitys budget, which could either reduce the size of the array or cause delays in soliciting proposals, DeJong said. While the community will study the panels over canals to understand the waters effects on solar panel efficiency, it wont do similar research on the panels on West Side Reservoir, though DeJong said they have been in touch with NREL about studying them. The enterprise will be part of the system that may one day offset all the electrical demand and carbon footprint of GRICs irrigation system. The community, they love these types of innovative projects. I love these innovative projects, said GRIC Governor Stephen Roe Lewis, standing in front of the canals in April. Lewis had his dark hair pulled back in a long ponytail and wore a blue button down that matched the color of the sky. I know for a fact this is inspiring a whole new generation of water protectorsthose that want to come back and they want to go into this cutting-edge technology, he said. I couldnt be more proud of our team for getting this done. DeJong feels plenty of other water managers across the West could learn from what is happening at GRIC. In fact, the West Side Reservoir was intentionally constructed near Interstate 10 so that people driving by on the highway could one day see the floating solar the community intends to build there, DeJong said. It could be a paradigm shift in the Western United States, he said. We recognize all of the projects were doing are pilot projects. None of them are large scale. But its the beginning. By Jake Bolster, Inside Climate News This article originally appeared on Inside Climate News. It is republished with permission. Sign up for the ICN newsletter here.
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