hiVelocity, an online magazine highlighting the people and businesses that are helping to transition Ohio’s economy for future generations, recently interviewed ADI Wind in Sheffield Village, Ohio about how they're improving the operation of wind turbines.
Support from a Lorain County Community College Innovation Grant and the Defense Metals Technology Center helped ADI Wind design and build a 125 kW prototype gearbox as well as a test bed. ADI Wind now is an offshoot of Advanced Design Inc. specializing in the new unit.
The new gearbox is six times or more lighter than conventional units. This is accomplished by the unique gearing and reaction configuration allowing speeds to reach high gear ratios with significantly fewer parts and a much smaller size.
Ohio’s long history of manufacturing excellence and the continued transformation of its industrial base make Ohio the ideal location for global leadership in the wind energy industry. With thousands of companies in its advanced energy supply chain, including more than 675 established and emerging companies in the Ohio wind supply chain, Ohio has become a leading United States component supplier for wind turbine Original Equipment Manufacturers.
With its commitment to leading the United States to energy independence, Ohio is the perfect home for wind energy business.The state’s significant natural, intellectual, manufacturing, and policy resources all support success in wind energy.
The Renewable Energy Policy Project ranks Ohio as the second largest “impact state” for job creation as the United States expands its wind energy resources.This means that more jobs could be created in Ohio than all other states except California as wind turbine production is enhanced nationwide.
Click here to read the full story from hiVelocity about how ADI Wind is improving the operation of wind turbines.
I read a great article by The Plain Dealer about what Ohio's GrafTech International has been up to -- how their technology may be right in your pocket.
There is a little piece of Cleveland technology in the smart phone in your pocket, in the big flat-screen TV on your living room wall and in the high-end laptop you have been coveting.
It's a piece of graphite engineered to a high-tech thinness that makes it as flexible as paper without affecting one of its hallmarks -- the uncanny ability to sop up and dissipate heat better than any metal. Without it, the gee-whiz gadgets would burn up from the heat they generate.
(Source The Plain Dealer, July 17, 2010. Read the full story here).
GrafTech products, which include graphite electrodes, advanced carbon and graphite materials, and flexible graphite, are manufactured on four continents and sold in more than 80 countries around the world. Continuing a century-old tradition of global leadership, the employees of GrafTech are united in their dedication to common goals: continually improving productivity and safety, delivering the highest levels of quality and value to customers, and creating value for shareholders.
GrafTech has received funding from the Ohio Third Frontier for several projects. The Ohio Third Frontier is an unprecedented and bipartisan commitment to create technology-based products, companies, industries and jobs. Since its inception, the Ohio Third Frontier has created, capitalized or attracted more than 600 companies, has created nearly 55,000 direct and indirect jobs and helped create $6.6 billion in economic impact in Ohio, a 9:1 return on investment. The State of Ohio also helped GrafTech move its global headquarters to Parma, Ohio in 2006 with the Job Creation Tax Credit.
Click here to read more about what GrafTech's doing at its global headquarters in Ohio.
As president and chief executive officer of Anderson-DuBose, a logistics company specializing in food service distribution, Warren Anderson has found that Ohio’s central location and world-class transportation infrastructure reduce operating expenses and provide greater opportunities to reach new milestones in growth and prosperity.
Lower transportation cost isn’t the only business advantage Warren has found in Ohio. Pro-commerce policies implemented by the Ohio Department of Development have paved the way to new expansion through low-interest loans and grants.
"The state has made it very attractive to retain the business here, to the point where this is where our home base is going to remain,” Warren shared in an interview with me.
Warren has also found a personal advantage to running a successful business in Ohio. The same interstate system that speeds his trucks to their destinations also speeds him home to family and the pastimes he enjoys most – boating – on nearby Lake Erie, attending his children’s sporting and ballet events and catching a Cleveland Cavaliers game.
The NASA Glenn Research Center in Cleveland develops critical systems technologies and capabilities that address national priorities in partnership with U.S. industry, universities, and other government institutions. World-class research, technology, and capability development efforts are keys to advancing space exploration of the solar system and beyond, while maintaining global leadership in aeronautics. NASA Glenn is distinguished by its unique blend of aeronautics and space flight expertise and experience. The Center’s work is focused on technological advancements in space flight systems development, aeropropulsion, space propulsion, power systems, nuclear systems, communications, and human-related systems.
hiVelocity, an online magazine highlighting the people and businesses that are helping to transition Ohio’s economy for future generations, recently interviewed the director of NASA's Glenn, Ray Lugo. Ray has been around America's space program since he was a kid -- and now he could be at the epicenter of changes within the space agency as President Obama has proposed a redirection of NASA priorities. That shift in focus could propel the Glenn Center to the top of the agency's research centers, leading the development of new technologies that will be the foundation of future space flight, and feeding millions of science and technology dollars into Ohio's economy.
Ohio’s complete spectrum of aerospace, aviation and advanced propulsion technologies - both military and commercial – make the state attractive to businesses and executives in the aerospace industry. Ohio is home to 24 astronauts including Neil Armstrong, one of the three members of the Apollo 11 crew. Apollo 11 was the first manned mission to land on the Moon. Ohioan Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin took the first steps on the moon on July 20, 1969.
Click here to read hiVelocity's interview with Ray.
Ohio is the nation's leader in advanced propulsion and derivative power technology providing a world-class research environment that includes two dedicated federal aerospace laboratories – Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton and NASA Glenn in Cleveland – and ten aerospace related doctoral programs at Ohio universities. Graduates of these institutions provide a cluster of highly skilled and educated workers.
In addition, Ohio's aerospace industry is supported by the state's Ohio Third Frontier, a $1.6 billion initiative to help catalyze connections between companies and academia.
No state can match Ohio’s capabilities in aerospace propulsion and power – from basic and advanced research, to technology development, to systems development, to sourcing of component suppliers, and final product testing – all critical phases of aerospace propulsion and power development take place in Ohio.
Dayton, Ohio has always played an important part in the development of American aviation technology, from the birth of flight as home of the Wright Brothers to the latest aeropropulsion military advances today. It's no wonder the Dayton Air Show, taking place this weekend on Saturday and Sunday, is one of the most popular events of its kind in the country. It brings a $3.9 million economic impact to the Dayton area annually.
