What’s New at the MSUB COT/Summer 2011
Taisei Wind Turbine Ribbon Cutting on June 8
On Wednesday, June 8, 2011 there was a ribbon cutting ceremony to officially commemorate the new vertical-axis wind turbine on the MSU Billings COT campus. Built over the past nine months, the new vertical-axis wind turbine is a collaborative project by Japanese and Montana companies. Taisei Techno Ltd. of Japan designed and built the turbine's components. Four Billings firms also worked on the project: CEI Electric served as general and electrical contractor, Krivonen Engineering was in charge of turbine structural and foundation design, Roscoe Steel built the structural components, and Rhyno Stinchfield of GreenWorld Partners is Taisei's United States agent. Tsuneo Noguchi, the turbine's designer, attended the dedication with several other Taisei executives. Noguchi, a pilot and aeronautics and aircraft designer, created the tall blades to resemble airplane wings, which pull and push their way through the wind for greater efficiency.
The blades, decorated with the MSU Billings logo, rotate around a center pole. The 42-foot-tall structure is mounted inside a frame of four poles. Taisei has an office in Billings and is working on setting up a Montana corporation to build the turbines.
The COT's $80,000 turbine, which also will generate electricity for the West End campus, eventually will be donated to MSU Billings.
Students at the COT's Sustainable Energy Technician program will be monitoring and collecting data from the new wind turbine. The program, which started in January, has 17 students enrolled in the program. Students can earn a two-year associate of applied science degree or one-year certificate of applied science. This program was made possible by the Wind Montana grant, a partnership among MSU Great Falls, MSU Northern, and Montana Tech COT in Butte.
Students learn basics such as electronics, physics, pneumatics and hydraulics that can be applied to a long list of sustainable-energy technologies such as wind, solar, fuel cells, geothermal, hydroelectric and internal- and external-combustible engines. They could work in maintenance, operating or sales of equipment, for companies loaning money to alternative energy projects, or coordinating projects for Native American tribes.
In addition to the new vertical-axis wind turbine, COT students are getting a lot of hands-on training. Students have assembled a mobile photovoltaic system, which uses sunlight to generate electricity that Sustainable Energy Instructor Warren Louis hopes to take to an area ranch to power a pump bringing water to a remote stock tank this summer. Students also are building a propeller wind turbine.
During the dedication June 8, Taisei CEO Muneyashi Shibagaki announced that his company will donate two scholarships to students in the COT's sustainable-energy program.
