Cochrane High School Solar Project

Cochrane High School students installed 30 solar panels and one wind turbine on the school roof in 2004. A team of 14 students and two teachers raised over $47,000 over five months, focusing on solar energy to make it more mainstream and financially viable. The project, partly funded by $5,000 from C3, earned the praise of environmentalist David Suzuki and former Alberta Environment Minister Guy Boutilier, who both attended the project's dedication ceremony.

"We're starting to change the way this town thinks, and we're going to keep that in motion," said Tristen Cones, one of the students working on the 2004 program.

The school's sustainable development group received an Emerald Award in 2005 for its efforts and has tackled the football scoreboard as its next solar project. C3 provided a second grant in 2006 for the solar scoreboard project.