2016, San Antonio de Areco, Buenos Aires, Argentina
This project is based on the school developing and creating three educational modules about how to use solar photovoltaic energy, hydraulic energy and wind energy. This project was implemented together with the UNSADA (San Antonio de Areco University).
2016, San Antonio de Areco, Buenos Aires, Argentina
– EES Técnica N1 “Jorge Alfredo Maciel”- San Andres de Giles. Students: Pablo Díaz, Mario Miguel Martínez, Juan Gastón Guerrieri, Ignacio Menchaca.
– The B.E.L.U. Project proposes the construction of a prototype designed to transform mechanical energy into electricity.
The aim of this project is to contribute with the environment, raising awareness in the community about clean and healthy energy. It also shows how we combine healthy exercise with concern about energy resources.
2016 Greeley, Colorado, USA
Dustin’s initial proposal did not make it to the final 10. However, Dustin believed he had a quality idea to improve his watershed. He raised the money and implemented the project on his own. He was awarded the 2015-2016 Environmental Action Award and $200.
Dustin is a sophomore this year at Greeley Central High school. Dustin’s idea was built around helping to reduce the Carbon Footprint of our school by supplying every teacher’s desk a power strip mounted with Velcro. This allows teachers easy access to the switch so that they can disconnect their energy vampires every night. He purchased the power strips using grant money that the Environmental club, the Green Cats, had received from Wal-Mart for a digital energy information kiosk. He then organized a group of students who went to all 80 classrooms after school and mounted power strips inconvenient locations for the teachers. This was followed by a school wide power down day in which we were able to see in real time how much less energy we were using through a website called PowerTakeOff. The district had set this up for a handful of schools to monitor their power usage. Everyone was involved in this power down day from the custodial staff to the kitchen to the administration. Dustin was instrumental in making this happen. He even put together 80 bags of treats and passed them out to classrooms that were reducing their energy use! This took a huge amount of organization and people managing skills to accomplish! Dustin showed great maturity and leadership throughout this process. If a school can cut down their electrical usage it can reduce the production of harmful particulates in our air and our water.
2015 Berthoud, Colorado, USA
The students of Berthoud High School noticed that lights in the school are left on all the time – even if there is no one inside the room. They wanted to make a difference, so the students installed motion-triggered light switches in bathrooms around the school. The lights go on when a person enters the bathroom and after 5 minutes the lights turn off. This helps the school to save money and electricity; reducing their environmental impact by using less fossil fuels, and allowing the school to use the additional funds for other important items around the school and community.
Since implementing the new light system, the lights in the bathrooms have been off 25% more than before! The motion sensored light switch may be a small-scale project but it is a great start for saving energy and reducing associated costs. Buildings around the world could easily implement the same project, but on an even bigger scale.
Becoming environmentally friendly can benefit everyone!
2015 Greeley, Colorado, USA
This project consists of a foot-powered hand dryer that uses no resources and saves tons of resources. To combat the major problem of paper waste and the electricity used as an alternative, this students’ proposal was to create a foot powered-hand dryer. This foot powered hand dryer will create no emissions from electricity generation and will have no paper waste from thrown away paper towels. The only energy consumed: calories. Only waste created: heat. If the hand dryer is installed in one bathroom, it can save 13.5 trees worth of paper towels, and 810 lbs. of coal in electricity generation over the course of one school year. The GUSTO-MATIC 5280-X has many environmental benefits. The immediate benefits include no paper waste, and no electricity consumption. This has many secondary effects, like no deforestation for the paper towels, no need to make more room in the land fill or take out the trash every day, no water pollution, no energy consumption from power plants, meaning no air pollution from the power plants.
2014 Duggan, San Antonio de Areco, Buenos Aires, Argentina
The Duggan Agricultural School educates on pig, sheep and cattle production, as well as dairy and poultry industry; an industry that not only produces consumer products but also contaminating effluents. They intend to address this problem by installing a biodigester to transform the animal manure into biogas and organic fertilizer for internal use.
Organized and directed by Energizar (Foundation focus on renewable energy) and a group of volunteers of UBA (University of Buenos Aires) they worked alongside the students and headmaster of the school to create this biodigester. This project is an educational solution associated with the environmental care, and it is also an educational tool for students to learn directly in their school how the energy is transformed.
2014, San Antonio de Areco, Buenos Aires, Argentina
The aim of this project is to carry out a massive, long-term campaign on the local radio stations, promoting and encouraging the community to reduce their use of non-renewable energy. The students are in charge of creating these messages and delivering them; designed as a long-term commitment, the campaign is meant to deliver a constant reminder to the entire community.
2012 Villa Lia, Buenos Aires, Argentina
This project, presented by the rural school N3 located in Villia Lia, was to improve the new schools building energy performance by installing a solar heating system, using internal and eternal insulating material, and strategic planting of trees. Apart from communicating their actions to the community, the students also proposed a law that would force new schools in the jurisdiction to take these implementations into consideration; a local provincial senator was involved in the proposal process.
In order to begin the implementation of this project, the students arranged a meeting with the school principal to install an internal and external sensor. This sensor measures a number of factors such as temperature, relative humidity, direction and speed of wind, and precipitation, among other things. The project intention is for students to be able to develop a database that allows them to evaluate the results of the proposed implementations over time. The students also proposed the creation of a class that studies the mathematics, physics and statistics supporting environmental sustainability issues and management.
To collaborate in the implementation, CNC commissioned a sustainability audit of the building by the architect Guillermo Duran, a specialist in sustainable architecture. With this audit, CNC is going to create educational material for all students that are part of the watershed.
2012 Greeley, Colorado, USA
Katie Ainslie at Greeley High School placed 1st in 2012.
The aim for her solution of using solar powered energy is to decrease and eventually diminish the use of coal powered energy leaving our watershed free of pollutants. Starting by lowering the demand for these fossil fuels in Greeley schools, Katie wanted to cause a ripple effect throughout the Cache La Poudre Watershed.
Two major benefits come from this alternative energy resource. First, the school will save a substantial amount on their energy bill. More importantly, they are protecting their local watershed from harmful emissions caused by coal power, thus saving a limited resource and producing cleaner energy.
With the demand for a renewable and sustainable energy source, solar energy has become a great resource that is not only available to Katie’s school but to all schools in our watershed.
This project started out as a no-cost project for the school district, but they have agreed to make this a pilot study for a possible city wide solar garden. The solar panels are leased rather than owned, and installation and maintenance will be completed by a solar company.
Negotiations are proceeding with several Colorado solar firms for panel construction at the Poudre Learning Center. Installation could not happen at Central High School so the PLC was suggested as a second site. School District 6 will help cover a portion of the construction cost.
The schedule for installation of the panels will be in 2013 when the local electric power company, Excel is able to finance a rebate for a portion of the solar panels to meet their solar energy requirement. When the solar panels are installed they will be put on a 20 year Power Purchase Agreement which will buy energy from the solar company’s panels at the PLC. The energy purchased will be 15- 25% less than our current energy bill.
Katie says, ” I really appreciate working with my mentor, Kim Frick, the PLC and CFW staffs, along with the incredible support (over $2,000) from Nutrien to make this solution a reality.”
2012 Greeley, Colorado, USA
Vanessa Martinez, Jose Martinez & Eric Trujillo from Northridge High School stated “within our watershed there are hundreds of diesel engine buses that transport thousands of students to multiple schools in the Greeley-Evans area. The diesel engines are not only expensive, but are also hazardous because of contaminants they emit into the air of our watershed and environment.”
Thus, their solution is to convert one diesel engine bus into a bio-diesel engine and compare the two. The goal is to show the difference bio-diesel engines can make. It will help make the transportation safer for the children of District 6, and help keep the air cleaner.
The school district was unable to get biodiesel buses because of lack of biodiesel fuel however they are getting energy saving, natural gas-based buses instead which enabled the students to implement their project. We will continue to work with the district to follow up with data comparisons between regular buses and the new natural gas fueled buses. The expected completion date is the spring of 2013.
“We aspire to eventually convert all the buses in our district once we have the effective data needed as reasonable evidence to prove natural gas bus’ better efficiency.”
-The Magic Green Bus Team
The students expressed their appreciation for the support from Nutrien to implement the project, funding from a local natural gas company to purchase the buses, and the district’s willingness to fund the cost of this project to complete it.