Mother Nature threw some nasty weather at Northeast Ohio this January. We had rain, sleet, snow, mud, and to top it off, a two-inch layer of ice.  It was ugggghhhly!

Winter weather is not ideal for raising a 100-foot monopole and mounting a large wind turbine on top, but a very determined crew did just that.  The installation took place at Lake Metroparks Farmpark, an agricultural education facility owned and operated by Lake Metroparks.  This working farm is located in Kirtland, a rural area about twenty-five miles east of Cleveland. It's visited by over 180,000 people per year, including 50,000 students.

The monopole was custom-designed. It consists of three sections and three specially-constructed booms to hold weather monitoring instruments. The crew joined and raised the lower two sections and secured this assembly to the 20-foot deep concrete foundation. Then they added the top monopole section. Finally, late on the afternoon of January 4^th, the 20 Kilowatt (kW) Jacobs turbine was fastened into place.

Thanks, in large part, to generous funding from First Energy Solutions, Farmpark's wind power is now a reality. The Jacobs turbine joins a 25 kW solar array installed by Green Mountain Energy last year.  Now wind and solar power will supply clean electricity to Farmpark's Plant Science Center.  Covering approximately 7,100 square feet, the Plant Science Center features horticulture, educational displays, and a small training area.

As the saying goes, all good things take time.  The turbine installation follows six years of wind monitoring and many months of coordination by Green Energy Ohio (GEO), First Energy Solutions, and Lake Metroparks Farmpark.  The project is an exciting one. Thousands of visitors from the entire Northeast Ohio area will be able to see and experience renewable energy up close and personal ? many for the first time! Because this hybrid system is interconnected to the utility, any excess power that is generated will be fed back to the grid. This is expected to reduce the park's electrical costs significantly.

Many individuals and organizations deserve credit for their efforts. The wind monitoring project was spearheaded by a committee of GEO volunteers. This group gathered and analyzed meteorological data, suggested suitable wind turbines and installed educational posters about wind power. Mentor-based Engineering Endeavors, Inc (EEI) designed the 100-foot monopole, as well as the booms for GEO's new monitoring equipment.  GEO volunteers, Tom Rapini and Fletcher Miller, worked with First Energy to install the equipment. EEI and wind power system expert, Mac Carter, oversaw the tower raising and wind turbine installation by Tri-County Tower Service and Midwest Crane Rental, Inc. Wiring and grid-interconnection of the system was performed by First Energy Solutions engineers and technicians.

Plans are underway at Lake Metroparks Farmpark to create a renewable energy educational center and GEO's new generation of monitoring equipment will play an important role. Not only will the instruments capture and record weather data to help measure the turbine's efficiency, they will feed output to real-time displays. The displays will give visitors a rare opportunity to watch nature and renewable energy technology working together. Support for the educational center comes from the Ohio Department of Development Office of Energy Efficiency.