ECE Student's Capstone Project Revamps Windmill for Elementary Schoolers

An ECE student's Interdisciplinary Capstone project at the Tucson Village Farm involves converting a decorative windmill into a power generator for one of its buildings. Not only will the project provide a community service, it also serves as positive youth development.

“I think a lot of us were interested in the fact that Tucson Village Farm was a nonprofit organization,” said mechanical engineering major and project procurement lead Justin Schoentag. “They’re definitely an organization that’s focused on doing helpful things for the community.”

But the students were not allowed to alter the aesthetics of the windmill, and considering that wind in Tucson is sporadic, they quickly realized powering a building as planned was not doable.  

“By the time we connected to the grid to enter that electricity into the building, it would all be lost, pretty much,” said ECE major and project lead Shane Lawler.

So the team worked with advisor Thom Plasse, a senior instructional specialist at the farm, to redefine the project scope. They shifted the plan to creating a standalone, off-the-grid educational demo for schoolchildren. Though the windmill can’t generate enough energy to power a building, it can produce enough to demonstrate the concept of wind energy to students.

“We kind of made the new goal of the project to be educational,” Lawler said. “There are a lot of children who visit the farm, and we thought, if anything, this is an opportunity to educate and inspire them on the benefits of renewable energy.”

The team is installing a metal locker at the base of the windmill to store controllers and batteries and an interactive plexiglass display on top.

The Tucson Village Farm is a 4H youth development program that is part of University of Arizona Cooperative Extension.