A Trip to Suzlon on 20th January 2006

A TRIP TO THE WINDFARMS AT SUPA

On the chilly morning of the 20th of January 2006, the students of Dhirubhai Ambani International School assembled in the school, eager and excited (even at 530 in the morning) at the prospect of visiting a wind farm. I had always heard about how wind energy is important, especially since our coal and oil reserves are fast disappearing. So at 6:00 we boarded the buses, and began our 6 hr long journey to the Suzlon wind farms. I spent my time listening to music and munching on my snacks while my friends were fast asleep. We reached the wind farms at around 11 and freshened up. The presentation on the wind farms was very informative, and I found the trip to the CMS (Central Monitoring Station) and the windmill extremely informative. Setting up and maintaining these windmills are indeed costly, but wind energy is, most importantly, eco friendly and a renewable energy resource. The farm at Supa supplies energy to three different substations in the region, and is indeed doing very well. Our journey back to Mumbai was relatively faster, and definitely a bit more exciting as most people were awake:. We stopped at Mc. Donald's' for dinner and reached school at 10 pm.

This was indeed a very unique trip, and I learnt and understood the significance of wind energy, both from a business and environmental perspective; something I could never have done sitting in the classroom

OUR TRIP TO SUZLON - Priyal R. Chitale 9 - B

It was an early morning, as the students of classes 9 - B and C of the Dhirubhai Ambani International School readied themselves for a day trip to the Supa Suzlon wind farm, situated in Ahmednagar. On the downside, we had to travel for six hours one-way in order to visit the farm. For a change, we went according to schedule and actually set off from the school at 6:00 a.m.!!! We were separated into two buses with five groups of six students to each bus. The teachers on our bus were Ms. Bajaj, Mrs. Maiti and Ms. Dutt. The buses were soon full of chatter and laughter as we settled down and started enjoying the ride.

We had our first glimpse of the massive windmills at around 11:00 a.m., as we approached the wind farm. We arrived at Suzlon at 11:15 a.m., after which we were shown two presentations which gave us a rough idea as to what exactly IS wind energy, what goes into its harnessing and usage, and an introduction to the Suzlon wind farm. Soon after, we were again separated into our two buses, and were taken to the Central Monitoring Station (CMS) and one of the windmills, where we were given a basic introduction as to how Suzlon controls the operation of the windmills. We had our lunch at 2:00 p.m., and it was quite ironic, as one of my friends was cutting her birthday cake, whereas another was throwing up!! After lunch, Mrs. Haribhakti, who had organised the whole trip for us, gave us a small lecture so as to give us a rough idea about Suzlon's business position. Then, two students, Anushka and Pranav gave a thank you speech and we thereafter proceeded to our buses.

I think the three hours that we spent there at Suzlon made us more aware of our surroundings. It taught us how wind energy is inexhaustible and non-polluting and epitomizes the term 'green energy'.

We stopped for dinner on the way, at 8:15 p.m. at McDonald's!! All of us were obviously very excited, and had a blast…. I think this was the most fun part of the trip and I'm sure many others would agree with me!!

We finally arrived at the school at 10:00 p.m., 30 minutes before schedule, so all of us had to wait for our parents to come and pick us up. It was a wonderful end to a wonderful day - after all, all's well that ends well!

Our Trip to Suzlon