August 15, 2014 at 4:40 p.m.
Three Lakes High School joins SolarWise program
Three Lakes High School joins SolarWise program
In addition to the MIT-chartered Fab Lab (fabrication laboratory) under construction in the school, new solar panels were installed on the roof Wednesday.
The panels will provide energy savings to the district, and a unique learning opportunity for science students.
"We're very excited. This was an outstanding opportunity for us and I have to give credit to one of my young staff members, Ryan Bock, who was instrumental in getting a similar project put in at Lakeland when he was teaching over there. He started the grant process and really ran with it and we were fortunate enough to be chosen," said principal Dr. William Greb. "It's one thing to learn about solar energy and clean energy, but it's a whole other thing to be hands-on with it, really immersed in it."
Greb said the panels, while a separate project, will work in conjunction with the learning opportunities presented by the Fab Lab. The panels will also help get students ready for the Wisconsin Public Service Solar Olympics.
"Down the road we're looking at our Fab Lab and integrating the two projects and really expanding our students' learning opportunities," he said.
"We'd like to send our students down to the solar contest, but the difference now is instead of buying a kit for their solar car, they can now do the math, they can do the physics and they can determine the optimal torque necessary to make a car run faster and longer and actually build the gear box for it from scratch. This is significant for us."
The Solar Olympics are one of many initiatives put in place by WPS to widen the educational opportunities for Wisconsin students.
"This is all part of our SolarWise for Schools program which is run through WPS and the WPS Community Foundation," said Michael Moore, senior renewable and product services consultant for WPS.
"For our annual Solar Olympics contest, if a school is participating in the program and has a system like this, they're invited every year in May to come to one of three UW colleges and compete in the event, which is like a solar science fair. It's a great opportunity for the kids."
"We have a belief that energy production needs to come from a variety of sources and we know that solar and wind energy is more expensive - though the technology is getting better - but the more familiarity we have with it, ... it helps us make good decisions and someday the students from the school could be the ones that come up with the innovations that make this very cost-competitive with other forms of energy and that's good for everyone," he added.
The panels will also save the school money on energy costs, Greb said, but the real prize is the doors they will open for students.
"My understanding is these panels will produce enough energy to run four science classrooms," he said.
"But it's the students that will gain the most. WPS is providing us with K-12 curriculum. Students will be able to come up and see the panels, touch them, feel them, go back into the classroom and put that to work."
Moore agreed.
"This is nice because it's accessible to the students. It's also got a really nice data system so the teacher and the school can go in and see the actual output of the system and get all the data," Moore said.
"There's even some software available so the school can put it on monitors so the whole school can see it."
Beyond energy savings and academic opportunities, Greb said he's proud the Three Lakes School District is doing its part to help keep the Northwoods pristine.
"We live in the (Northwoods) and it doesn't get any better than clean energy to really enable us to keep the Northwoods pristine," Greb said. "This is a step in that direction."
While the panel installation took place Wednesday, an official dedication ceremony is being planned for the fall.
Marcus Nesemann may be reached at [email protected].
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