Greenhills Renewable Energy Dashboard (GRED) Public Web Site

Greenhills School in Ann Arbor, MI is sharing data, documentation and related resources from the Greenhills Renewable Energy Dashboard (GRED) for the benefit of teachers and students in other schools. GRED performs 24/7/365 collection, display and archiving of performance data from the school's rooftop renewable energy assets which include a 50W-peak wind turbine, a 5W solar array and a green roof. It also gathers data from a rooftop weather station. The low power wind turbine and solar array are devoted entirely to student education; they are not tied into the school electric grid.

The primary reason for sharing the GRED data is so that teachers at other schools can use it as a resource for their students. Relevant educational topics include: energy, weather, data analysis and STEM. The real-world (i.e., not simulated) data provides a unique opportunity to compare and contrast the performance of a wind turbine and solar array subject to the identical environmental conditions and to observe the impact of changing environmental conditions (as captured by the weather station) over periods of minutes, days and months. The data provides a complete characterization of the voltage and current outputs of the two energy sources and relates those to the power provided in parallel to the GRED's 12V battery and the two 5W LEDs which periodically discharge the battery under software control. Rooftop temperature measurements show the value of the green roof to reduce a building's heating/cooling demands in the face of daily and seasonal variations in air temperature and solar radiance. It is hoped that teachers will gain hands-on experience with the GRED data, formulate lesson plans for their students, evaluate the benefits and share their experiences with other teachers. Teacher feedback, lesson plans, student results, etc., will be added to this web site as they are provided. 

Another reason for sharing the GRED data and its associated documentation is to alert administrators and teachers at other schools about the possibility of duplicating the basic GRED capability (renewable energy assets, viewable data acquisition hardware, real-time display and on-premises data archive) at their schools for a moderate cost. Low power wind turbines and solar arrays are available for a few hundred dollars or less. In contrast to utility-grade counterparts (multiple kW systems), they can be installed and maintained without the need for a professional electrician and their outputs can be measured and recorded with correspondingly economical equipment. The proven GRED hardware design and its custom control software are available for use by other schools for the added benefit of their students. For more information, please contact the POC provided below.

GRED data is available for download HERE.The data archive dates back to March 2015 with continuing daily updates. Wind turbine and solar array voltage, current and power statistics are provided on a daily, hourly and minute-by-minute basis augmented by weather station parameters (wind speed, solar radiance, air temperature) that are key wind turbine and solar array performance drivers. Other weather station measurement statistics are recorded on a hourly and daily basis, as are temperature measurements taken underneath the green roof and at the surface of the standard  "white roof" that covers most of the school.

Those that are new to the GRED data are strongly encouraged to first watch a video walk-through (available HERE) of a documentation reference file (available for download HERE). The video augments the information contained in the reference document, providing details on the rooftop renewable energy assets, the data acquisition process and the format and content of the spreadsheet, text data files.The video also steps through the process for downloading GRED data files and importing them into a standard data analysis software package.

Those that are new to the GRED data are also encouraged to watch another video (available HERE) that presents and discusses some example GRED data plots. The plots illustrates many of the basic characteristics of the data and the commentary reinforces many of the important points touched on in the documentation video. It is further hoped that the video will help teachers to innovate ideas on how to use the GRED data for the benefit of their middle school and high school students.

History

The GRED initiative at Greenhills was started by Chris Gleason -- a middle school science teacher, now retired from Greenhills. Following a major school renovation, Chris' husband, Jim (a retired electrical engineer), volunteered to design, implement and maintain the current capability with financial support (for equipment) from the school administration and installation support from the maintenance and IT staff. A major component of Jim's effort was development of the custom GRED control software.

Jim and Chris can be reached at jmgleasona2@gmail.com. Comments and suggestions on all aspects of the data, documentation, resources and web site are welcome and encouraged.

Related Resources

• Chris and Jim gave a presentation titled "Renewable Energy Dashboard for Student Education" at the 2016 NSTA National Conference in Nashville. A 45-minute video walk-through of the presentation is available HERE. The first 15 minutes describes the GRED capability at a time prior to the creation of the public web site. This is followed by a discussion of some ideas on how to use the GRED data for middle school and high school education.The video concludes with a discussion of the cost to replicate the basic GRED capability at other schools.

• Chris and Jim gave a GRED presentation after the creation of the public web site at the 2017 MSTA (MIchigan) Annual Conference in Novi MI. The PowerPoint briefing is available HERE.

• A July 2016 Greenhills Educator's Blog on "Why Build a Renewable Energy Dashboard" is available HERE.

• A 1-minute video that shows the dynamics of the GRED real-time display on windy and partly cloudy day is available HERE.