Testing the Power of Wind – Sustainability Science for the STEM Fair

Sixth-grade students created a model wind turbine from recycled plastic bottles to explore how the wind turbines they see on the highway generate energy.

Wind Power & Sustainability Science

If you've ever driven by a wind farm on the side of the road, you may have wondered how they work. Wind turbines, which use wind energy to generate electricity, play an important role in discussions of clean and sustainable energy.

With their 6th-grade project for the school STEM fair, Eden and Helena, students in Milpitas, CA, experimented to see how the design of the rotors is related to a wind turbine's efficiency. They selected the Make the Wind Work for You! aerodynamics project because they were inspired by the idea that "windmills save energy that we can use to power the world."

Prior to their project, the students didn't really know how wind turbines worked. "We saw them on the freeway when on road trips," they said. "We knew they [had something to do with sustainable] energy, but we didn't know their true power."

In the project, Eden and Helena made a model wind turbine from recycled bottles and experimented with different rotor designs to see which produced the most energy. They tested this by seeing how much weight the spinning of the rotors could lift. Eden and Helena also tracked the rate at which each type of rotor spun, which they said was the most challenging part of their project. "We finally figured out how to count [the spins per minute] by taking a video of the spins and counting that way."

Both students said their project gave them new insight into the potential of wind as an alternative energy source. "It changed what we thought about how wind can conserve so much energy in the world."

"We believe that our project was one of the coolest projects we have ever done in all our science fairs! It taught us about how energy transfers from object to object, and it even gave us some skills in public speaking and better explaining!"

Eden and Helena say they are both thinking ahead to a future in STEM. Eden is interested in astronomy, and Helena is interested in psychology.

Thank you to Eden and Helena for sharing their STEM project story with Science Buddies. If you have a story about doing a Science Buddies project or how Science Buddies makes a difference in your classroom or program, reach out to us at [email protected].