Approaches to Nonconventional Energy Conversion Education

During a session of the first Intersociety Energy Conversion Engineering Conference, a panel discussion dealt with approaches to nonconventional energy conversion education. This short paper covers the contribution of this author. It is realized that these topics should be covered during university studies; however, the question of where in a curriculum, or when during a student's university career formal courses should be offered, has not yet been answered. The author suggests that only a small number of engineers are needed in this area, and that there is really no space in any undergraduate curriculum to give these topics the amount of time they require. Accordingly, the place for such studies is on the graduate level, at the very few universities which can expect to interest a sufficiently large number of students in order to develop and carry on a specialized program in an economical way.