By JAN LARSON McLAUGHLIN
BG Independent News
As the young girl pedaled the bicycle, her efforts first turned on the radio. As she pedaled harder, she created enough energy to turn on LED light bulbs. And if she pedaled really hard, she turned on the old-fashioned light bulbs.
Pretty sneaky way to teach kids about energy.
“You’re pretty strong,” Daryl Stockburger, assistant director of Bowling Green Public Utilities, told the young girl.
“When you use these light bulbs, you’re making the electric company work really hard,” Stockburger said of the older bulbs. “Tell your parents to use LED bulbs.”
Stockburger was talking about Bowling Green’s energy efforts recently to a group of kids gatherered at Wood County District Public Library. He talked about the new solar field, the wind turbines and hydropower.
Stockburger, who is more accustomed to talking energy with adults, did his best to bring the discussion down to the level of the children. He was helped out by Maria Simon, head of youth services at the library, who is more accustomed to taking technical topics and making them understandable to young minds.
Simon was the Gracie Allen to Stockburger’s George Burns.
“She’s generating 5 amps,” Stockburger said as another girl tried pedaling the energy bike hooked up to appliances.
“I think she should come to my house. I think she could run the dishwasher,” Simon said.
Children listen to energy program at the library.
The program was part of the library’s summer children’s program on Building a Better World. The children provided a challenging range, with one crawling around tracing the shapes on the floor, to another asking about geothermal energy.
Stockburger talked about the city’s new solar field – which is the largest solar array in Ohio. He quizzed the kids about where the field was located. Columbus? That’s our capital, Simon offered. OSU? Go Bucks, she said. Prospect? Sounds promising, Simon said.
When it turned out to be in Bowling Green, the kids cheered.
So then they were quizzed on the number of solar panels in the field. Turned out to be 85,000.
“Can anybody count that high,” Stockburger asked.
Which led some kids to start counting.
“Kids will take you seriously,” Simon advised.
Later is was the kids’ turn to quiz Stockburger.
“How many light panels are there in the whole world,” one child asked, successfully stumping Stockburger.
Stockburger talked about fossil fuels, hydro power from the Ohio River, and the solar panels that generate power at Kenwood Elementary School. He talked about the wind turbines that tower over the county landfill, west of Bowling Green.
“I think I’ve been in that one,” a boy said, pointing at a turbine photo shown by Stockburger. The doors at the base of the turbines are like submarine doors, he said.
“That to me looks like a little mouse door,” Simon said.
Children spin their arms like wind turbines.
Again, Stockburger quizzed the kids. How tall are the wind turbines?
First guess, 92,590 feet. Second guess, 5,000 feet. The actual height, 390 feet.
“It’s much taller than the Statue of Liberty,” Stockburger said.
Some European countries get 30 percent of their energy from renewable power, he said. The U.S. gets about 16 percent of its power from renewables.
The energy program fit perfectly with the summer program on Building a Better World, Simon said.
“What’s better than to promote what’s happening in our own city to help the whole wide world,” Simon said.
“These guys are the future,” she said, looking at the children. “And they have a lot of energy.”
