State legislators get wind of student's energy research

There’s something in the wind that has led one MSU student to the state Capitol.

International relations junior Cory Connolly’s ideas about wind energy applications for schools may be incorporated into state legislation on renewable energy.

Connolly’s concept deals with net metering — the idea that excess energy produced by a wind turbine can be fed back into the power grid and sold to the utility company.

“The basic idea is that, particularly in the state of Michigan, school districts are underfunded, and, at same time, we want to promote renewable energy,” Connolly said.

“So it’s something that, if assessed correctly, certain schools may be able to take advantage of it if the dynamics of funding and implementation are right.”

Connolly focused on wind energy but said it could be applied to other renewable energy sources, like solar power.

Connolly’s idea began when he worked with the Roosevelt Institution and did a larger assessment on wind energy.

The assessment began last December and was published in March, said international relations and economics junior Dan Blue, president of the MSU chapter of the Roosevelt Institution.

“What made it almost easier for Cory was all of us sort of had a foundation in wind energy and we knew where to look so Cory knew what he was looking for and where to look for it,” Blue said. “He had a great idea and he applied it.”

Connolly’s paper on integrating wind energy in schools was published in “25 Ideas for Community Development,” a collection of student papers from members of the Institution nationwide.

“The national organization had a legislative outreach person who contacted a few people who had expressed interest in the idea and Rep. (Paul) Opsommer (R-DeWitt) was one of them,” Connolly said.

On Sept. 19, Connolly and Blue met with Greg Ostrander, a staff member from Opsommer’s office and another staff member from the office of Rep. Terry Brown, D-Pigeon, to discuss the idea of wind energy and net metering.

“We let him know that his idea was very similar to what we were working on,” Ostrander said.

“Our bill will call for government to start to use net metering and we also want to make money available for schools to employ energy efficiency standards, LEED certification and net metering.”

Schools won’t be the only focus, but have the advantage of providing an education component to students as well as lower taxpayer dollars in the long run, Ostrander said.

Connolly said being able to see how the legislative process works is a plus.

“It’s really piqued an interest for me in public policy and these kinds of issues,” he said.

“Now, having looked more at environmental things and public policy, I’m very interested in environmental policy, which is kind of something I’d hope to work with in the future.”

Published on Sunday, October 5, 2008