This Year’s Midland Experience

By Andreas Karelas - For the third year in a row, blueEnergy has sent a team down to Los Olivos, California to teach the sophomore class at Midland High School how to build a wind turbine from scratch. The workshop is part of Midland’s innovative “experiential week” where students tackle hands-on projects to complement their classroom learning. Each year the sophomores stay on campus to spend the week learning about renewable energy and to install a 2.5 kW solar array.

Mathias Craig, blueEnergy Executive Director, attended Midland (class of 1996) making it all the more meaningful for him and for the students. Now that we’ve been down there the last three years, those of us who are returning blueEnergy team members feel right at home when we get back to Midland. It’s many of the same friendly faculty faces that work with us year after year, who house us, cook for us and take care of us while at Midland.

This year’s sophomore class of 23 students was double the size of last year’s class and required a few tweaks in the program. We also incorporated last year’s feedback to improve the content and organization of the workshop, making it run ever more smoothly.

This year’s workshop featured six blade-carving stations where students built two complete blade rotors, a magnet station where every student learned about the power of rare-earth Neodymium magnets and a coil winding station where students wound, soldered and wired up a stator for the wind generator.

The team consisted of Mathias Craig, Executive Director, Tim Kent, intern in the San Francisco office, Andreas Karelas, former blueEnergy volunteer in Nicaragua, Jamie Sebora, photographer extraordinaire and Mathias’ classmate at Midland, and Garett Maggart, the woodworking champion.

Led by Lise Goddard, head of Midland’s Environment Program, the Midland faculty members are also getting more familiar with our workshop and were able to play crucial roles in organizing and teaching the students everything from blade carving to coil winding to magnet placing.

In the evenings, our discussions this year focused more on off-grid renewable energy systems, climate change, the importance of appropriate technology, and blueEnergy’s experience in Nicaragua, and less on the physics theory that the students will see in the classroom next year as juniors. The students were very engaged every step of the way and got deep into thinking about how energy is generated and managed and the tremendous impact it has on our lives. This will serve the students well as they continue their studies and think about the impact they want to have on the world outside of school.

With excellent food, good company, a group of students that were eager to work hard and take ownership of their projects, a supportive faculty, and a stellar blueEnergy team, this year’s workshop turned out to be a great success. It even included some intense afternoon and evening basketball games with mixed blueEnergy – Midland teams.

For the first time we assembled all the pieces of the turbine, mounted it on an 8-foot stand and let it spin in the wind. This was satisfying for all of us having put in two days into crafting every component. The turbine generated a record of 14 volts, lighting up a bulb for all to see.

The final night in a summer camp-like manner we gathered around the wind turbine lit up with solar powered Christmas lights and played guitar and sang together to celebrate our work.

Pictures from the workshop can be seen here.

A great time was had by all, and I know the blueEnergy team can’t wait to return again next year.

blueEnergy would like to give special thanks to Will and Marguerite Graham for welcoming us on campus, Lise Goddard and all the participating faculty for their tremendous help putting this whole thing on, Jamie Seborer for the photography, Garett Maggart for his exceptional woodworking skills, the sophomore class for their energy and enthusiasm and Otherpower.com for their support assembling the workshop materials.

Andreas Karelas is a blueEnergy alum who volunteered in Nicaragua in 2007 working on the initial Monkey Point wind and solar installation.  He now lives in San Francisco and runs a community based solar organization called RE-volv that lets anyone and everyone chip in to help build renewable energy projects in the United States

blueEnergy France Hosts Wind Turbine Building Workshop

By Pierre Jamault - blueEnergy rendezvoused on October 20th, 2012 in the city of Le Kremlin Bicêtre, close to Paris to host a Wind Turbine Building Workshop. Behind the parking lot we discovered a very well furnished workshop with a dynamic team of volunteers waiting to show us how a wind turbine works by building a small one. After coffee, basics instructions were set up: 1 turbine built by 16 people on 7 workbenches in 2 busy days.

During these two days we had to sand wood, wind copper wire, mold magnets, shape metal and weld it. The explanations of the team were so efficient that we even had enough time to listen the presentation of blueEnergy and its activities by co-founder Guillaume Craig.

The variety of needed tools to build the turbine required some explanation in order to not make any mistakes. Thankfully the instructions and indications given by the volunteers, as well as discussions with the other participants, were really enriching. The meals prepared by our host were also great opportunities for other interesting discussions with the participants and hosts.

Welding the body

After all that work and many explanations in a very (too) short weekend, it wasn’t easy to remember everything but the wind turbine mechanism seemed clearer. To sum up: to succeed in wind turbine construction, you have to be a great craftsman, a little bit physician and obviously meteorologist to put it at the good place once it is taken out the workshop.

Carving the blades

blueEnergy France organizes 2 windturbine workshops per year (next one on Spring 2013, contact emilie.etienne@blueenergygroup.org for more details), with a maximum 12 participants, close to Paris. The windturbines are small models (1 meter diameter), based on the Hugh Piggott model. Although they work well, due to their small size and low power, they are used mainly for learning purposes. We gather people from different backgrounds to attend the workshop: students in renewable energies, retired people willing to know more about the windturbines to build one in their garden and individuals willing to spend an unforgettable week end by working for fun!

WindEmpowerment at Rio+20

By Mathias Craig (with contributions from Piet Chevalier and Gaël Cesa) -- Piet Chevalier (i-love-windpower Mali and Siemens wind power), Gaël Cesa (Tripalium) and Mathias Craig (blueEnergy) attended the Rio+20 UN Sustainable Development Conference in Rio de Janero, Brazil, from June 16-20 on behalf of WindEmpowerment. We were invited by Siemens AG and Siemens Stiftung to participate in their "Technology in Action" display initiative at the Conference. The opportunity materialized because WindEmpowerment's Technical Director, Piet Chevalier, is an employee in the Siemens wind power division, working as an engineer on off-shore wind turbine design and because of his work in Mali and with WindEmpowerment, he was able to convince Siemens to support WindEmpowerment's attendance.

The purpose of the visit was four-fold:

1) to display WindEmpowerment in the Siemens/UNEP tent to promote the association,
2) to identify potential funding sources for WindEmpowerment,

3) to teach a hands on wind turbine building workshop, and

4) to work with a local NGO to install a wind turbine in the Rio de Janeiro area.

Prior to the conference Piet built two Siemens-funded wind turbines in Holland and shipped them to Rio. These two turbines were used for display at the conference, one going outside the UNEP tent and one inside near the speaker’s podium.

Piet and Gaël arrived in Rio on June 2^nd to connect with local organizations about the wind turbine workshop and installation, to prepare the display installations and to acquire the materials, tools and space needed for the workshop.

           

There were many challenges in preparing the display installations, in particular for the outdoor one, including concerns about safety, the construction of a tower and more. But Piet and Gaël persevered and were ultimately successful in getting two very high profile, attractive displays put together.

The displays attracted the attention of high-ranking members of Siemens, including the CEO of the Renewable Energy Hydro and Solar division, the CEO of Siemens Brazil (shown below), and a very high ranking member of the managing board. It also drew the attention of visiting dignitaries, institutional representatives and academics.

Throughout the key four days of the conference, Mathias had multiple opportunities to speak from the podium in the UNEP tent and explain WindEmpowerment. This helped the association gain broader exposure to an interested audience.

During the conference, we learned of a competition being held by Siemens Stiftung called “empowering people. Award”. The award is intended to support organizations and individuals whose innovations are contributing to development and bettering lives around the world. We are exploring the possibility of applying for the award, which could be an opportunity for WindEmpowerment to gain broader exposure.

Prior to the main conference and in parallel to it, Gaël and Piet organized a complete wind turbine building workshop. There were 8 participants in the workshop: 6 university students from the University Federal Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ), one member of a social organization and one engineer.

Gaël led the workshop and over a period of 8 days the students completed a 2.4m, 48V Piggott wind turbine from scratch.

The students were part of a group at their university that promotes agroforestry and composting in Rio and the surrounding areas and this wind turbine workshop was a nice hands-on addition to their experience.

In addition to this complete workshop, a series of mini-workshops were given at the start of the conference on blade carving and on the theory and design of the turbine. These sessions at the UNEP tent were attended by 30 students, many of who were interested in staying involved beyond the conference.

At the conclusion of the conference, Piet and Gaël worked to install the wind turbine produced in the Rio workshop and put it into operation. The turbine was installed on private property in the town of Araruama, about 1.5 hours north of Rio. The advantage of the site is that many low-income farmers have access to the site and there is potential to link the system to an abandoned school that could be transformed into a wind turbine training center.

The installed system is comprised of: 2.4m Piggott wind turbine, 40ft tilt-up tower, MorningStar 45 charge controller, Phoenix 750W 48V DC 220 VAC inverter, 4x 12V 160AH battery bank (in series).

The tools purchased for the workshop are stored on this site for future use in wind turbine building activities. With all the interest generated at the conference and the workshop we are optimistic that this initiative is just the beginning of an emergence of small-scale wind power in Brazil.

A picture album of the activities can be viewed here. A video of the wind turbine workshop can be viewed here.

For more information about WindEmpowerment’s presence at the Rio+20 event, please contact Piet Chevalier @ piet@i-love-windpower.com

Crafting a Wind Turbine in a Single Day: Berkeley High School Students Get it Done!

By Kate Graham -- The Green Academy is a small learning community at Berkeley High School where students participate in interdisciplinary and experiential learning projects related to ecology and sustainable energy. This is one of five schools participating in the PG&E New Energy Academy, a program created in 2010 as the result of a partnership between PG&E and the California Department of Education.

Green Academy teacher, Mr. Jamie Robertson, invited the blueEnergy education team to lead a wind turbine workshop for students in his Energy Physics class. Mr. Robertson asks his students to look at conceptual physics through the lens of what it has to teach about sustainable energy. Students consider questions such as: How does one define energy? Why is it used? Why isn’t it free? What alternative energy options are currently available? The blueEnergy wind turbine workshop provided a hands-on opportunity for students to explore the answers to such questions.

On May 23rd students gathered with blueEnergy educators in the Berkeley High School metal shop. Setting up production stations between iron sculptures, collections of ceramic work, scraps of metal and a wood fired kiln, blueEnergy staff members and volunteers led students through the stages of creating a wind turbine system. Mathias Craig taught students to use a drawknife, hammer and chisel, plane, and sand paper to sculpt blades from Douglas Fir. Pauline Caumon and Phil Homer helped students carefully insert high powered magnets into the turbine’s rotor. Andreas Karelas demonstrated how to coil copper wires and solder coils together to make a generating stator, and Christian Casillas gave presentations on wind power theory and function.

Sawing wind turbine blades can be tricky -
Mathias gives a lesson to two fast learners

Copper wire coiling station with Andreas

 The morning session moved along in high gear breaking only for a few slices of pizza before pushing through the afternoon heat to complete the turbine. Mr. Robinson and Mathias closed the workshop with a final group reflection and Q&A session, and then invited students to take turns rotating the wind turbine generator. Cheers erupted as the wind turbine proved its effectiveness by powering a small light bulb and water pump.

The wind turbine will be displayed on campus to serve as a symbol for all students to consider the many possibilities associated with alternative energy sources. The Berkeley High School community should be proud of the Green Academy class for pulling off the enormous feat of creating a wind turbine in a single day.

Who said it couldn't be done?
Proud students stand with their new wind turbine

Check out more photos from this incredible day here.

If you are interested in learning more about blueEnergy wind turbine workshops please contact Kate Graham at: kate.graham@blueenergygroup.org

Another Successful Wind Turbine Workshop at Midland High School

By Andreas Karelas - In early April a team of three blueEnergy educators taught a wind energy workshop to the Sophomore class at Midland High School near Los Olivos, California.

Midland is a unique treasure. This boarding school for grades 9-12 immerses students in the real world, where they work the land, they build with their hands, and they even build fires to heat their showers. The school was founded on the principle of self-reliance, and teaches students to discern the difference between their needs and wants. It was an incredible group of students to work with.

Mathias Craig, a Midland graduate, Christian Casillas and myself, who had taught a workshop at Midland last year, were delighted to be invited back. All of us have experience building wind turbines with blueEnergy in Nicaragua, and were thrilled to be able to pass on the knowledge to a group of interested youth. We packed up the car in Berkeley with boards of Douglass Fir, coils of copper wire, extremely powerful magnets, and an arsenal of woodworking tools.

When we arrived, the students began a three day immersion into the world of small scale wind turbines. We began with an introductory discussion to explain the parts of a wind turbine, how it generates power, and how it is designed. We were fortunate to be joined by Jamie Seborer, Mathias’sclassmate, who helped photograph the workshop.

In the workshop is where the real fun began. Students honed their skills on scrap boards using tools such as the drawknife, hammer and chisel, plane, grater, and file. Midland students in small teams were excited to get started. They measured and chiseled away at their boards, carving what would be fine wind turbine blades out of big blocks of wood.

During the workshop students also learned about the electrical generation components of the wind turbine. We coiled copper wire and soldered the coils together to make a three phase generating stator. We learned how to arrange magnets on the rotor that would cause electric current to flow in the copper coils when the wind turbine spins. Once we’d assembled the various components, the students did a great job of presenting what they worked on and how all the parts function together.

Andreas and the coil winding team

Our last discussion focused on the work blueEnergy does in Nicaragua and the intricacies of bringing clean energy and water to underserved communities. Christian led the students in a board game he developed while working in Nicaragua to help fisherman identify opportunities to improve their livelihoods. The students had a blast. We finished the workshop with a party on their farm with delicious pizza made fresh in their brick oven.

The faculty and students of The Midland School were an amazing group of people with whom to spend a few days, and for the three of us coming from the Bay Area, it was a special treat to be out on the farm. Led by a student, the three of us ventured up Midland’s famous Grass Mountain for an early hike on our last day before the drive home.

The workshop was an all-around success and I think Midland, and blueEnergy alike, are looking forward to another one next year.

You can see pictures from the workshop here (courtesy of Jamie Seborer).