Windham Initiative for Renewable Energy (WIRE) will commence the installation of a photovoltaic solar array and a wind turbine at Windham High School in spring 2012.
Wind Guys USA, based in Rye Beach, New Hampshire, will install Southwest Windpower's Skystream 3.7 Wind Turbine and ReVision Energy, a full service renewable energy contracting company, will deploy photovoltaic panels on pole mounts at Windham High School. The capacity of photovoltaic panels to be installed ranges from 12 to 240 W.
The 2.4 kW wind turbine will be fixed on a 45-foot tower and it can be easily handled by the school staff. The staff can tilt down the turbine and use it to study about the renewable energy sources. The tilt down feature will help students to observe the generator components, gearing and associated electronics in the Skystream wind turbine. Perhaps most importantly, students will be able to collect long term data from the wind turbine and solar panels for more significant project work and self-directed investigation.
Another important feature of the project is that students will be able to attain long-term data from the solar array and wind turbine for self-directed research work. The data from the weather station, solar array systems and wind turbine will be available within the school and science laboratories. In addition, the data will be available online to Windham residents through a monitoring system.
The renewable energy system achieves the objective of WIRE’s Alpha project, which describes the deployment of a medium-sized wind turbine, photovoltaic solar array, monitoring system and weather station at Windham High School and allows WHS students to gain hands on experience in the renewable energy field.