A Course in Sustainable Power Generation

Sustainable power generation is a very timely and necessary topic in engineering education. A three-credit hour course in this discipline has been established at Baldwin Wallace University that concentrates on the physics and engineering aspects of various technologies including solar cells & panels, batteries, fuel cells, windmill generators, hydro turbine-generators, thermoelectric and geothermal. Solar-power generation is allotted the most coverage given its continuing use and addition to electrical-power generation. Coverage of batteries is also given ample coverage given their importance in storage most currently for automobiles. Windmill turbine-generators is also given ample coverage given its importance in the sustainable-power scheme. Geothermal power generation is briefly considered though the technique is mainly used for building heating and cooling. Nuclear power production, though considered a sustainable-power-generation technology, is not covered for lack of time. The economic and social aspects of the cited methods are not considered as this is a technical course. The state-of-the technology and areas of current development for the various disciplines are emphasized. As the course covers a wide range of technologies, depth of treatment for each must be carefully considered. Several references are used for lecture preparation, whereby students are provided a paper copy of each lecture as well as the lectures being posted on Canvas, the online course system. No textbook is assigned for lack of identifying a text that sufficiently covers all the technologies addressed in the course in the manner desired. The paper will discuss the power-generation areas covered in the course and the depth of coverage for each.