Southwest Windpower

Class initiative

The Spectrum (UT)
December 1, 2008
www.thespectrum.com

There's a saying: "The youth are the future." In Milford's case, youth there set a precedent for the entire nation thanks to a self-professed shop teacher who believed in that adage and applied it.

In 2001, while Andy Swapp was plowing his field, a powerful wind kicked up the topsoil and carried it so fast that it took the paint off of his barn. It was that moment he decided there was no better opportunity to teach students about wind energy than in their own environment, where forceful winds inundate the area.

A renewable energy class was created at Milford High School and began with students learning about wind speed. Hand-held wind-measuring devices were made, followed by the students erecting a 20-meter tall tower with an anemometer on Swapp's property provided by the state anemometer loan program.

Swapp said geometry's Pythagorean theorem was used to set the anchors and the base for the tower, and the students collected data to create wind pattern maps. Soon, the classroom project attracted the attention of the wind farm industry, including First Wind, an independent North American wind energy company.

Larger towers followed at the high school and Milford Elementary, where students collected data that was shared with interested businesses, such as Southwest Windpower, which had been a donor to the project. Over time, the vital information gathered revealed that 10 miles west of Milford would be an ideal location for a wind farm.

Presentations by Swapp and his students to the local governments resulted in new ordinances that permitted First Wind to invest $400 million in a 203-megawatt wind corridor that will have 97 turbines over 40 square miles.

Ground was broken Nov. 14 for what will be the largest wind farm in the state of Utah to be fully operational by the end of 2009 with a new transmission line from Delta to sell power to California. It is awe-inspiring to contemplate that it all began with a single thought by a teacher who believed that students were a valuable resource and then acquainted them with energy technology options from which lessons for life could be learned.

Thanks to Swapp and the students who took his renewable energy class over the past several years, an estimated 225 jobs for construction and 15 positions for operation and maintenance will be created at the First Wind Milford Wind Corridor.

Students who facilitated the economic development may have careers awaiting them in their hometown. That deserves a big round of applause.

Congratulations, Andy Swapp and your students, for what could be a success story for years to come for Milford, Southern Utah and the state - perhaps even the entire country.