SDSU engineering instructor Mike Twedt says SDSU's Wind Application Center uses small wind projects to teach K-12 and university students the basics of wind development.

South Dakota State University faculty members and students are providing the expertise to help elementary and secondary schools across the state embrace wind energy.

Mike Twedt, an instructor in SDSU's Department of Mechanical Engineering, said that's one of the main functions of the Wind Application Center at SDSU. The center provides technical assistance to the Wind for Schools program, which places wind turbines at K-12 schools throughout South Dakota.

Sanborn Central became the first school district with such a demonstration wind turbine project. Another project was recently completed at the Douglas School District in Box Elder, while five others are pending at various locations, including Elkton. Four or five more schools are likely to be added in early 2009, Twedt said.

The idea of the Wind for Schools program is to use the residential-sized wind turbines as working laboratories with which K-12 students can explore wind energy and related topics.

But Twedt said the program has important benefits for university students, too. At SDSU, it's providing collegians the chance to do hands-on engineering work while pursuing their degrees. "Since we have the Wind Application Center here, we use engineering students to help these K-12 schools do the wind assessments , and we provide technical help with siting, permitting and so on. So our students become familiar with how to implement a wind project," Twedt said.

"Essentially, installing one of these small wind turbines has all the same steps as implementing a much bigger one, so our students become well-versed in how to do this."

Those engineering students will leave SDSU with a good background in the steps necessary to make a wind energy project work, Twedt said a logical step toward working in the wind energy field, for some.

Meanwhile, Twedt said SDSU is also using its students to mentor K-12 students at participating Wind for Schools districts who have an interest in studying engineering .

"Here at SDSU we're doing so much research already, and we're so involved with bioenergy and wind energy and photovoltaics , that these students have a tremendous opportunity to come here and develop their interests in those fields," Twedt said.

The SDSU Wind Application Center is one of five such centers in five western states: Kansas, Colorado, Nebraska, South Dakota and Montana. The program is sponsored by the federal Department of Energy through the National Renewable Energy Laboratory.

Learn more about the SDSU center at its Web site, http:// www.sdwind.com/wac/.