Stories

Solar power inspiring the next generation

June 13, 2019

Children from an Alice Springs school have been learning about why their local environment is ideal for producing solar power.

The group of about 70 year sev­ens from Cen­tralian Mid­dle School took part in one of four pack­ages avail­able through the Edu-Tourism pro­gram, coor­di­nat­ed by Desert Knowl­edge Aus­tralia (DKA). 

Their excur­sion was fund­ed by the Intyal­heme Cen­tre for Future Ener­gy, a flag­ship project of DKA, aimed at help­ing the North­ern Ter­ri­to­ry achieve 50 per cent renew­able ener­gy by 2030

Intyal­heme want­ed to inspire chil­dren to under­stand how solar pow­er is pro­duced, and per­haps con­sid­er a career in the industry. 

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Magnify DSCF3063 Shila Salai and Daniel Briggs 2

Shi­la Salai and Daniel Brig­gs with a solar grasshopper

Engi­neers from local tech­ni­cal con­sul­tan­cy Ekisti­ca explained renew­able and non-renew­able sources of ener­gy to the stu­dents, who then built their own solar grasshop­pers, and test­ed them in the sunshine. 

The sec­ond half of the ses­sion was spent at the DKA Solar Cen­tre, a demon­stra­tion facil­i­ty that mon­i­tors real-life per­for­mance of a wide range of solar pho­to­volta­ic technologies.

12-year-old Shi­la Salei said she was impressed” to learn the Solar Cen­tre pro­duces about 40 per cent of the ener­gy used at the Desert Knowl­edge Precinct. Mean­while, 11-year-old Daniel Brig­gs was par­tic­u­lar­ly tak­en by the track­ing arrays. 

I liked mak­ing the grasshop­pers, and learn­ing how the solar pan­els work, espe­cial­ly look­ing at the ones that track the sun,” he said. 

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Magnify DSCF3107 Solar bingo winners Brandy Loechte and Jack Magnay

Solar bin­go win­ners Brandy Loechte and Jack Magnay

12-year-old Brandy Loechte was one of the win­ners of the solar bin­go” com­pe­ti­tion. She was thrilled to dis­cov­er the unique facil­i­ty in Alice Springs. 

I saw the gates to come here but I nev­er knew what this place was until today,” said Brandy. 

It’s pret­ty cool because there are a lot of solar pan­els every­where, and it’s good because there’s a ton of sun here which makes this place special.” 

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Magnify DSCF3102 CMS students with Ekistica engineer Shalini Ganji and Intyalheme General Manager G

CMS stu­dents with Ekisti­ca engi­neer Shali­ni Gan­ji and Intyal­heme Gen­er­al Man­ag­er Glenn Marshall

Year Sev­en teacher Mikaila Man­go­hig said it was impor­tant to expose stu­dents to career options they might not oth­er­wise be aware of. 

Under­stand­ing the dif­fer­ence between renew­able and non-renew­able resources is a part of the Year Sev­en sci­ence cur­ricu­lum, and the engi­neers from Ekisti­ca did a great job explain­ing this,” Ms Man­go­hig said. 

It was great for stu­dents to learn in a hands-on envi­ron­ment what solar pow­er is and how the dif­fer­ent com­po­nents work togeth­er to get ener­gy from the sun to our pow­er points.”

In addi­tion to the Solar Cen­tre pack­age, the Desert Knowl­edge Precinct Edu-Tourism Pro­gram also engages STEM pro­fes­sion­als from the Cen­tre for Appro­pri­ate Tech­nol­o­gy to deliv­er a ses­sion on sup­port­ing remote communities. 

There is also an expe­ri­ence avail­able with Geo­science Aus­tralia, where stu­dents learn about satel­lites and how to fly drones; and a hands-on Coun­try and Cul­ture expe­ri­ence, designed with Batch­e­lor Insti­tute. For more infor­ma­tion email info@​dka.​com.​au.

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