The New Southwest / Growing futures

Growing futures

Student-build wind generator powers Kino School greenhouse

By Ann Davis

Tucson Green Times – September 2009

Students and teachers at Kino School, 6625 N. First Ave., (www.kinoschool.org) hoisted a student-built wind generator into place on the roof of the school in August. In a moderate wind, it will generate more than 12 volts and up to 700 watts of electricity.

Ethan Nichols, who graduated from Kino School last May, built the 10-foot-diameter wind generator as his senior project. He worked over the summer with shop teacher Ed Davis to construct the roof mounting.

“It was a lot more work than I expected,” Nichols says. He needed to do research and budget costs, and learn about things like rectifiers and magnetic induction. He had to wind 10 custom coils of wire, which he then imbedded in fiberglass, and do a lot of precision, structural welding on thick steel.

Nichols is donating the generator to the school. He estimates he spent around $700 on supplies. “It would have been more, but CAID Industries (in Tucson) machined the disks for free,” he says.

Kino students and teachers have several ideas for how to use the electricity generated by Nichol’s creation, including using it to provide power for Kino’s new greenhouse, and charging batteries for student’s inventions, like battery powered vehicles.

A progressive, private, nonprofit school in Tucson for students from kindergarten through high school, Kino’s student body consists of about 80 students. Every senior must complete a senior project – an ambitious endeavor involving something that has an absorbing interest for the student.  Senior projects have included building a water harvesting system for the school’s gardens, writing books, making movies, building a forge, choreographing a dance performance, and creating portfolios of artworks.

This year Nichols is attending the Conservatory of Recording Arts and Sciences in Phoenix. He plans to be a recording engineer.

Author: Ann Davis, an attorney, began volunteering at Kino School in 1992 where she currently teaches history, government, and writing, and maintains the Kino school library. Both of her daughters are Kino graduates.