Savannah Tech's Solar Energy Program is Meeting a Growing Demand

President Barack Obama says energy efficiency is key to economic recovery.

During his speech at Savannah Technical College in March of this year, he told his audience and the world-it's not just jobs that are the future... but "clean energy" jobs.

Lester Wiggins, Department Head and Instructor of Electrical Construction and Maintenance at Savannah Tech, agrees.

"This is a big thing," Wiggins says. Solar power is the future of our country... and with our dependence on foreign oil, the mess in the Gulf of Mexico and all that's going on right now, everybody is looking toward alternative energy means."

Since the president's visit, Wiggins says interest in Savannah's Tech's solar energy program has skyrocted.

"Ever since then," Wiggins says, "we've had unbelievable calls on our program itself. We've got a program that is extremely strong. It generates exactly what it says it's going to do. These students actually completely install our photovotaics system on the artificial roof we have out back."

When Wiggins started the program four years ago, it was the first of its kind to be offered at a public college in Georgia.

Today, it's attracting students from all over the country... and also abroad.

Potiphar Nkhoma came all the way from South Africa to Savannah Tech to earn his certificate. "I live in Africa and a lot of the time, when you go to the village all of the villages out of the big cities... there isn't enough electricity... and I was thinking about how to combine that technology of renewable technology to help the villages."

When he graduates this quarter, he hopes to take what he's learned back home... to create opportunities for himself and make life better for others.

"If you look at issues like for instance, in my country where 80% of the electricity is produced using coal- it's a very high polluting energy and it's not readily available to the majority of the people... and I think this technology with modern technology is going to be much m ore easy to use, easy to install."

Wiggins says solar energy is just the beginning. He's receiving wind power training next month. Training he plans to pass along to his students.

By the way, Savannah Tech has expanded its Photovoltaic Systems Repair and Installation (Solar Energy) course to afternoons beginning this fall.

For more information on the program, contact: lwiggins@savannahtech.edu or 912.443.5861