Schools see future in wind power

As school budgets continue to tighten, Carsonville-Port Sanilac Superintendent Harold Titus thinks the district can find a natural way to pay its electrical bills - the wind. He thinks wind turbines, the modern equivalent of windmills, could take advantage of Sanilac County's windswept plains and produce electricity - and educational opportunities - for the school district.

"In the long term, the next generation will be doing things with energy that my generation never thought possible," he said Titus has invited Brion Dickens of Woodland Wind, LLC, in Pigeon to speak about wind potential at the April 18 board of education meeting. Dickens' presentation will include information about cost of the equipment, which Titus estimated to be between $200,000 and $400,000. Dickens was instrumental in helping Elkton-Pigeon-Bay Port Laker Schools in Huron County get turbines of their own. Dickens said C-PS, like the Huron County school, is in a region that lends itself to using wind turbines.

Laker Schools already has four wind turbines in place, but only two are fully operational. The district, which many people credit as being Michigan's first to generate power with wind turbines, has generated power for itself but does not receive money for power it sells to DTE Energy.

Though powering schools with wind is a relatively new concept to Michigan, schools in other states have achieved varying levels of success with similar projects since the mid-1990s, e.g. in Iowa, nine public school districts and one community college have already constructed wind turbines on their campuses.