In a war where the issues are cloudy and the consequences are even murkier, it's sometimes tough for me to hope for anything beyond the safe return of our troops. But while the conflict rages, I'm reminded that I can keep my hopes alive by looking for ways to build a cleaner, more peaceful future for our country. And a look at my conference calendar, with its listing of exciting green-technology events for this year, shows me how.

You can rub elbows and exchange ideas with pioneers in green electronics at the IEEE's 11th annual International Symposium on Electronics and the Environment. Held this year from June 19-22 in Boston, the ISEE brings together some of the best minds from the electronics industry and academia to share their experiences. For more information on this, or the IEEE's concurrent electronics recycling summit, visit www.isee2002.org.

America's premier clean-energy race, the Tour de Sol, will be held May 10-14. Once again, an extraordinary fleet of more than 70 experimental and production vehicles powered by electricity, hybrid-electric systems, alternate fuels and fuel cells will visit several cities between New York and Washington, D.C. They will include vehicle demonstrations, exhibits, educational seminars and entertainment. Find more information at www.tourdesol.org/.

Another highlight in my date book is the Environmentally Conscious Manufacturing (ECM) conference at the SPIE's International Symposium on Technologies for Robotics, Automation and Manufacturing. Slated for Oct. 27-31 in Providence, R.I., this conference gets down to the nuts-and-bolts issues centering on ECM. Topics covered will include clean manufacturing processes, product reuse, de-manufacturing, remanufacturing and recycling strategies. Contact conference chair Surendra Gupta at gupta@neu.edu, or visit his Web site, www.coe.neu.edu/~smgupta/, for details.

While I can't list all the green-tech events here, you should also look at the American Wind Energy Association's Windpower 2003 conference, May 18-21, in Austin, Texas, with details at www.awea.org/events/. Another must-see event is the "Sustainable Development" session at the 2003 IEEE International Conference on Systems, Man and Cybernetics, to be held Oct. 5-8 in Washington. Contact Gina Tang at ang@rowan.edu for more information.

With more companies getting serious about sustainability, adding some green-engineering know-how to your resume by attending one of these events may be an excellent career move.

Perhaps more important, these conferences represent an opportunity to get involved with technologies and issues that inspire hope-and that could reshape the world as dramatically as any military action.

Comments and questions can be addressed to Lee at lgoldberg@green-electronics.com.

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