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Wind Turbine at Sleith Hall the Brainchild of Engineering Adjunct Professor Curt Freedman G’87; View the Video!

Posted July 28, 2009

A wind turbine with eight-foot blades, recently built outside Sleith Hall, will provide electricity to the building’s mechanical engineering laboratory. View the video! It joins a solar panel complex (at the bottom of the photo) that will heat and supplement lighting in the same lab. The designer and project coordinator of this Outdoor Alternative Energy Laboratory is Curt Freedman G’87, an adjunct professor of alternative energy and energy management at the School of Engineering. View a photo album/slide show of the wind turbine and solar panels.

The wind turbine was mounted on a 52-foot-long-pole in late August. Read about the solar panels, which were installed earlier this summer.

Freedman says the Outdoor Alternative Energy Laboratory will help fulfill some of the School of Engineering’s efforts to apply alternative energy technology—from solar to wind power—to operate several of the laboratories at Sleith Hall. Indeed, FloDesign, a Wilbraham, MA-based firm run by a “who’s who” of School of Engineering alumni, is exploring plans to use the campus as a test site to compare its revolutionary wind turbine technology to traditional designs, producing usable electricity in the process.

Stewardship and caring for the sustainability of the environment, both within and beyond the campus, are goals outlined in the College’s 2009-2018 Strategic Plan. “In keeping with this philosophy, the School of Engineering is using applied engineering research to find green solutions for not only industrial partners, but also for the College,” says Bart Lipkens, chair and associate professor of mechanical engineering. “The School will also begin its green engineering curriculum this fall.”