Twelve-year-old Enzo Moschetta was shocked when his name was called as a champion of the KidWind World Challenge, a convergence of 550 students at the University of Wisconsin showing their prowess in clean energy design.
“I was really excited,” said Enzo of Indiana Township. “I didn’t think we would make it that far.”
He is among a trio of aspiring Dorseyville Middle School engineers, dubbed the Keystone Kinetics, that also includes Alan Yang and August Doller.
The team clawed its way to first place at the Pennsylvania KidWind Challenge held in March at Penn State University. Enzo and Alan then traveled to Wisconsin, where they earned top honors over 125 teams from Taiwan, Thailand, Estonia and more.
They captured the title of Middle School Wind Champions and earned the Rookies of the Year honor, bestowed to teams that demonstrate generosity, resilience and grace over the competition.
Willingness to adapt was a key takeaway, said Alan, also 12 and an Indiana Township resident.
“I thought our wind turbine would easily do well in all the different tests, but it turns out that we had many casualties,” he said. “Our blades shredded the wires for the Yaw-Testing. We burned out two generators and struggled to get a proper reading for the High-Speed Testing. On our final High-Speed Test, the turbines were spinning so fast that at the end all blades separated and exploded.
“We learned from our mistakes and are currently designing and 3D-printing new versions of the blades. I learned that anything we design will always have some flaws and will need improvements.”
The World KidWind Challenge was May 17 to 20 at the University of Wisconsin, aimed at students in fourth through 12th grades.
The trio of seventh graders spent hundreds of hours designing, learning, building and testing wind turbines leading up to the first-place win at Penn State, coach Ning Li said.
August, 11, who also lives in Indiana Township, said the special experience allowed him to “learn a few things that you can’t get inside of a school classroom.”
“While it did have its ups and downs, it was quite fun for me and allowed me to spend time with friends while learning at the same time,” August said. “I learned about concepts and equations that were more to the specific field, but I also learned about a few things that could be applied not only to turbine construction, building and other steps in the process, but also could be applied to real-life scenarios.”
Moving on to the World Challenge was both challenging and meaningful, Li said.
The rigorous competition included four rounds of wind turbine performance testing, two team presentations, two instant challenges and a written knowledge challenge.
The Keystone Kinetics pair beat out peers that included the Lab Rats from Texas, Mavericks from Kansas and SL Angel Wings from Taiwan.
“The experience was valuable far beyond the final result,” Li said. “The students had the opportunity to meet and talk with peers from different states and countries, exchange ideas and learn how other teams approached similar engineering challenges.”
Michael Arquin, founder of KidWind, said the competitive students represent the future of clean energy.
“The KidWind Challenge engages students, helps them learn STEM skills and prepares them for future careers in clean energy,” Arquin said. “We were incredibly impressed by the knowledge, teamwork, presentation skills and designs showcased.
“We are very proud of the award, but we are even more proud of the effort behind it.”