SCE lights way for solar project at Porterville High

Students in Porterville High School’s career and technology classes are getting a leg up in their careers, with an instructional boon that will prepare them for a future of going green.

Southern California Edison presented the school with a $25,000 check Thursday, before a Porterville Unified School District board meeting.

The money will go toward the purchase of solar panels and a 3,500-watt solar energy system the students will learn to build and operate. Eventually, the power generated will be used to run a classroom, according to Lois Pitter Bruce, spokeswoman for Edison.

“It is really practical,” she said. “It is sort of a new green energy thing. It is teaching these kids really valuable traits and skills that they can use in future employment.”

Located next to an electricity classroom is a trench, where students will learn the skills of installing solar panels and maintaining the system of collecting energy from them regularly, the school principal, Steve Greybehl, said.

“Adding an experimental solar farm is only part of expanding what we offer now into these new technologies,” he said.

The school’s career and technical classes have started to focus on the “green trades.” Some students will be enrolled in a class where they will receive hands-on training, while about 100 freshman will gain exposure to the installation and maintenance process of generating solar energy, he said.

In addition, the students will be able to run tests and conduct science experiments to find the most efficient means of generating energy, he said.

“So, we can learn about collecting and harnessing that energy and learn all the sciences that go along with converting this energy source,” he said. “So we can send out a skilled labor force that can install and maintain these solar energy panels.”

The green trades, he said, have been a focus among the four teachers in the school’s career and technology department. They are Tom Reed, Brad Collins, Carl Hammer and Tim Newby.

Collins, who teaches an automotive course, “already has the capacity to create biodiesel,” Greybehl said.

Reed, who is the department chair, wrote the grant. He teaches a construction class that builds a house every year as one of its projects.

This year the class project is different. The students will build the infrastructure the solar panels will be mounted on for the solar power farm, and will also construct the fencing, put in the concrete and run the electrical conduits required for the system, Reed said.

Each successive class after the first to carry out the process will repeat it, he said.

“That will really help to prepare them for the green workforce that is going to be growing in the next 10 years,” Reed said. “Edison really came through ... With the budget problems statewide, and also with the president’s focus on green energy, I think we are going to be needing more jobs in this area. And I think the kids are going to be more employable.”

Brian Thoburn, region manager for Edison, said the project is consistent with the company’s reputation for using renewable energy, and also for helping to train the younger generation on how to be good stewards of the environment as well as smarter, more efficient users of energy.

“Southern California Edison has three areas for our corporate giving: education, environment and meeting the needs of under-served communities,” he said. “And the great thing about serving Porterville High School’s solar education program, is that’s all three of those goals. So it’s a neat project to support.”

-- Contact The Recorder newsroom at 784-5000, Ext. 1043.