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“Windmobile” project of the Lycée Technique d‘Ettelbruck
Who or what is “Windmobile”?
The idea of the project was born in April 2005 and pioneered by Mr Guy Putz in his “travail de candidature” (teacher accreditation dissertation), in which he tackled the subject of “Potential applications of small wind power stations in decentralised supply structures”. This pretty quickly led to the desire to develop a project featuring small wind turbines at the Lycée Technique d‘Ettelbruck. The project was unusual in that it involved the actual construction of a mobile windmill. With the collaboration of Mrs Joëlle Rinnen, the idea rapidly took shape and was declared an interdisciplinary project at the LTEtt.
The project was launched in two classes at the start of the 2005/06 academic year under the supervision of Joëlle Rinnen, Richard Anner and Guy Putz. A T2EE electrician class and a T2CM2 commerce class regularly worked on the project, which pursued a few key objectives. The main idea of the project was and continues to be the raising of awareness about energy conservation. In addition to this, however, the project leaders also place importance on providing a platform for pupils and teachers alike that allows them to work together on a concrete project, ideally in an interdisciplinary manner. Nevertheless, the technical aspect is equally important, namely the development of a mobile wind power station that enables energy to be generated and is also capable of independently recording and measuring meteorological data. A further objective that can be aspired to over the long term is the possible use of a prototype in conflict areas.
The above-mentioned objectives have been constantly revised and supplemented by others. For instance, over time, the school developed its own windmill and the project was expanded to include a small wind tunnel for experimentation purposes.
Windmobile was and is the initiator of various finishing projects for both final-year technician pupils as well as the Year 6 technician class. These have resulted among others in the creation of a bicycle that generates electricity as well as an electrical wind tracking system for a small wind turbine.
Since 2009, the project has been led by Will Reiter and Guy Putz and has developed into the desired interdisciplinary project. Since 2005, the project has seen the participation of a total of approximately 20 different specialist areas and more than 50 different LTEtt teachers or staff. Much more impressive, however, is the number of pupils/children who have been involved in the project. Since 2005, a total of approximately 1500 pupils/children have taken part in this project. This number includes some 200 pupils who have participated in the project on a weekly basis, with the remaining 1300 participants made up of pupils/children whose involvement took place in the context of events such as C-Days at LTEtt or the “Windmobile@school” project activity.
Since 2010, the Windmobile project has also enjoyed a collaboration with the University of Luxembourg, enabling four students to base their final-year dissertations on the Windmobile project. Further projects, to be completed in the context of Bachelor theses, are currently in the planning stage.
Windmobile has evolved into an integral component of the extracurricular projects of the Lycée Technique d’Ettelbruck and stands out in particular due to its various subprojects, such as: