Green power engineering: Pedagogy for the next generation of electrical engineers

The modern power system faces the greatest challenges it has seen in its brief history: new technologies (generation, IT, etc.), market economics and competition, corporate environmental responsibility, and society's growing reliability expectations. Where will the expertise for the new generation multidisciplinary power engineer who must design, operate, and manage it come from? The training must begin at the undergraduate engineering level where the myriad of scientific and economic bases for the modern electric power system can be taught holistically. Increased demand for expertise in power engineering, and particularly green power engineering, comes at a time when many undergraduate EE/ECE curricula are already strained to address the many emergent topics created by technologic change in this rapidly evolving discipline. Fortunately, one university's experience using an agile learning environment demonstrates that key pedagogical competencies and experiences in green power engineering can be accomplished within an existing ECE program.