Wind Energy Center at Kalamazoo Valley Community College

Leading the way with Wind Turbine Technology

Home

Training

News

Wind Academy Gets $550,000 Boost From The Feds

Kalamazoo Valley Community College’s one-of-its-kind Wind Turbine Technician Academy will be able to increase its capacity for training the next workforce generation in this emerging alternative source of energy as a result of a $550,000 appropriation in the latest federal budget.

Allocated through the U. S. Department of Education’s Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education (FIPSE), the funds will be used to purchase specialized training equipment for the academy, which is based in the college’s M-TEC and is still taking applications internationally for the second 26-week edition slated to start May 17.

The funding request was sponsored by Michigan’s two Democratic senators, Debbie Stabenow and Carl Levin, and by Republican Congressman Fred Upton in the House of Representatives. The jointly passed budget bill was signed by President Barack Obama in late December.

The academy, which will graduate its first technicians on April 9, is certified by Bildungszentrum fur Erneuerebare Energien (BZEE). Its English equivalent is “Renewable Energy Education Center.”

Located in Husum, Germany, and founded in 2000, BZEE was created and supported by major wind-turbine manufacturers, component makers, and enterprises that provide operation and maintenance services. As wind-energy production increased throughout Europe, the need for high-quality, industry-driven, international standards emerged. BZEE has become the leading trainer for wind-turbine technicians across Europe and now in Asia.

“Kalamazoo Valley Community College (KVCC) is proud to lead the way as the country’s first national training resource certified by BZEE,” said President Marilyn Schlack. “We are excited by the federal government’s support for our efforts to train the technicians that will be needed to maintain and repair the giant turbines that populate wind-energy farms across the world.”

“By producing a highly skilled, wind-energy workforce,” said James DeHaven, KVCC’s vice president for economic and business development, “the academy serves as an incentive for manufacturing and renewable-energy development in Michigan, the Midwest and beyond.

“The KVCC academy is training the technicians that will be needed,” DeHaven said. “It’s up to the state and federal governments and agencies to make Michigan the Wind Energy State. This could restore and rebuild our manufacturing base.”

And that has already started. Energetx Components in Holland has received a $3.5 million clean-energy state/federal grant, along with tax incentives, to ramp up its capacity to manufacture components for wind turbines and for alternative-energy vehicles. A company spokesman projects that Energetz will employ 300 people when production kicks into full gear in 2011.

“This investment by the federal government in what KVCC is attempting to accomplish in wind energy will assure the training of a technically trained, wind-energy workforce at an affordable price,” said Cindy Buckley, executive director of training at the M-TEC of KVCC. “By building capacity in this program, that’s a win for our community, our state and our nation, and it surely is a win for our students.”

The academy can be completed in six months, making the program viable for retraining workers and for the training of the next-generation workforce. The program provides graduates with multi-craft credentials that are highly sought after by the wind-power industry for the construction, operation and maintenance of utility-size wind turbines.

“Companies are already calling us to find out how they can meet our graduates who will earn individual certification through the BZEE and become a part of an international labor pool,” Buckley said. “The projection is that between 1,500 and 2,400 new technicians are needed annually to support the growing wind-energy industry. Starting wages range from $14 to $21 per hour.”

A study by the U. S. Department of Energy identified the feasibility and potential rewards the United States would gain by pursuing the goal to generate 20 percent of the nation’s energy through wind by the year 2030. This speaks to employment opportunities as well -- especially in this part of the United States with Michigan’s unique positioning in regards to the Great Lakes basin.

Sailors have long known the power of the offshore winds. More formal studies have confirmed those winds are consistent and powerful – enough to produce as much as 322,000 megawatts of electricity from wind turbines. That’s 12 times more than the state’s entire peak demand.

The prospects are that wind power could greatly reduce the $24 billion that state residents and businesses pay each year in fossil-fuel imports.

Most – if not all of this – is within reach. The Great Lakes Wind Council reports that about 20 percent of Michigan’s 38,000 square miles of Great Lakes bottomlands are in less than 100 feet of water. Some of the locations would be definitely off-limits while others are considered conditional.

But, according to the council, almost 550 square miles of that 20 percent are in relatively shallow areas with plenty of wind many miles off shore. Those would be perfect sites for wind farms to produce energy that is unlimited, natural and impact-neutral.

Scheduled to graduate this spring, the academy’s pioneer class of 16 ranges in age from late teens to early 50s. They hail from throughout Michigan, Indiana, Ohio and Illinois, as well as Puerto Rico and Great Britain.

They brought with them degrees in marketing, law, business, science, and architecture, as well as entrepreneurial experiences in several businesses, knowledge of other languages, military service, extensive travel, and electrical, computer, artistic, and technical/mechanical skills.

The first step to gain access into the next academy is to complete the written application, which can be downloaded at this web site – www.kvcc.edu/training. Applications can be mailed or faxed to the M-TEC, or dropped off personally.

A math test is also part of the screening process, along with the results of a medical examination and documented work experience in technical fields.

The last step in the application process is a screening for an ability to function in tight quarters and work at great heights.

Those applicants who were not accepted into the first session are being carried over to the waiting list for the second. The fee is $12,000.

While still to be determined, the federal funds could be used to construct a training tower that could range from 80 to 150 feet tall to acclimate future technicians to working at heights and in tight spots.

“Because Michigan is the only state completely inside the Great Lakes Water Basin and virtually surrounded by four of the five Great Lakes,” Schlack said, “it is poised to be a national leader as the United States moves toward a comprehensive, alternative-energy portfolio.

“The winds of change are blowing stronger and stronger in this energy-producing field,” she said, “and Kalamazoo Valley -- with its one-year certificate for training wind technicians, the Wind Energy Center’s international academy to produce workers for the giant wind farms around the world, and a new eight-credit course in which students will design, fabricate and assemble a wind turbine -- is also emerging as a player on the state and national scene.”

For more information, contact Buckley at (269) 353-1250 or cbuckley@kvcc.edu.

For Additional Information

If you would like additional information regarding the Wind Energy Center, alternative energy or renewable resources, email us at windenergycenter@kvcc.edu