During a recent Snohomish County PUD Board of Commissioners meeting, the PUD hosted Snohomish County Government Councilman Nate Nehring to unveil the PUD’s Modular Microgrid Educational Exhibit.
The project is a partnership between the PUD and the County “and we’re proud of the work that went into its creation,” the PUD said.
Kellie Stickney, Lead Communications Specialist- Engagement at Snohomish County PUD, told Public Power Current that the partnership was led by Snohomish County Councilman Nate Nehring, who was inspired by visits to the PUD’s Arlington Microgrid project.
Snohomish County entered into an agreement with the PUD in 2022 to provide $75,000 toward the design and construction of an educational display exhibit based on the PUD’s Arlington Microgrid project, she noted.
The plan is for the exhibit to educate students and visitors about new energy technologies like microgrids, battery energy storage systems, electric vehicles, renewable energy and more.
The exhibit will primarily live at the Clean Energy Center in Arlington, but it’s also transportable for community events and classroom presentations.
Stickney said that some student interaction with the exhibit has already occurred at events such as the Evergreen State Fair.
“We are currently in the process of developing our strategy for bringing additional students to the Clean Energy Center. This work is being led by myself and our new Education Program Coordinator,” Stickney said.
“We’ll be creating a plan to activate the space for student field trips, career connected learning opportunities, and more. At this point we need to create a tour curriculum that is tied to State educational standards, assess the site to see if we need additional signage, and determine what funding is available for supporting students visiting the site,” she added.
The interactive exhibit “is designed to teach students and community members how a microgrid interacts with renewable energy and how it can restore power to critical infrastructure and homes when outages occur. It uses the infrastructure that is located at the Clean Energy Center to demonstrate how this works, but the purpose is really more about showing how these emerging technologies work in general,” Stickney said.
