SUN AND WIND TOGETHER

SolRWind: Company set to build hybrid solar, wind farm
Jennifer DeWitt, March 20, 2011 (Quad-City Business Journal)

"…[A] class of [environmental science] college students…[envisions] what the area will look…[as they are led by SolRWind CEO Amy Maresca through a field where her company will build] a hybrid solar and wind farm on a five-acre tract of the 200-acre Goose Lake farm…[who shows them] what the company must do as part of its environmental impact assessment.

"With plans for installing groups of wind turbines at three high-points on the acreage as well as solar equipment, the project is just one component of the start-up company. In fact, SolRWind was founded in 2008, as a research and development company by James Law, the company’s president…[H]e pulled together their small team of five…[and] recruited Maresca, a quality engineer who lost her previous job due to a plant closing, to run the business side of the company."

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"SolRWind is in the process of designing its own unique solar panel, which it plans to mass produce and sell to the industry beginning next year. It already is a distributor of other companies’ wind and solar energy products to the residential and commercial markets…[T]he Goose Lake farm…is one of three generation sites it is pursing. It is [also] working on a wind farm…and a solar garden…

"…[The Goose Lake farm] owner…approached [SolRWind] about a wind farm…But SolRWind envisions the manufacture of solar panels to evolve into the largest part of its business. While they are working with a Chinese manufacturer to assemble one component of the solar panel…[generation project development will] produce the jobs [locally]…[It is also] exploring a few locations to site the [solar panel] manufacturing plant…"

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"While wind energy is becoming part of the manufacturing fabric of the Midwest, solar power is just emerging…SolRWind has found itself having to educate potential customers, government representatives, bankers and others about the emerging industry and its products…[though players like SolRWind have] high hopes…

"The SolRWind team also sees the students…as part of their future…{Executives lecture to environmental studies [classes weekly]…But SolRWind also learns from the students, whose questions prepare them for those they could face from county boards, city councils and others…"