Looking back when I started this internship in May until now I can say that I definitely have a better understanding of renewable energy systems and how to properly install and work with them. This experience has been one that I will never forget and know that throughout my career after college I will continue to relate too my experiences at Creative Energies. Being that this is my final day I have been looking at all the pictures and documents that I have made and it is very obvious that I have really grasped how these systems function and am even more passionate about renewable energy now than I was before the internship.  I have first hand experience working with these different systems, which was one of my goals during the internship and by working on 20 projects I feel that I am knowledgeable about these different systems and how they work. The next step is to complete my thesis which I plan to have done by the end of December. This internship was exactly what I expected and it has given me all the information I need to complete my thesis and also have a thesis that stands out from the rest.

Creative Energies Team

I continued gathering all the information in regards to the electric truck and tried to make it easy for anyone to understand what needs to be done with the truck at this point. I placed all the fastensers in plastic bags and labeled them to make it easier for Toby and everyone else to figure out what goes where. I also made a spreadsheet that included all the contact information and the remaining tracking numbers that still needed to be check. I feel that the trasition over to Toby should go smoothly and there wont be any problems that they should run into.

I also made a complete list of all the jobs I worked on in the field and in the office. It was a surprise to see how many jobs I was involved in which in total was 20. I guess I didn’t really pay attention to how many I did because it wasnt important to me as long as I had the chance to be out in the field. Most of the people at the office are at the Pioneer Senior Center completing the wiring which is the last thing that needs to be done before the system can be up and running.

Waking up today for work was a struggle because we arrived back in Lander at 1 am from Jackson. I woke up so sore from the climbing the Grand that I felt like my legs had no strength. As my internship begins to wind down I have started to organize the parts and put together documents for the electric truck to make the transition easier for Toby when I leave. I gathered all the parts that have arrived the past couple weeks and organized them to make it simple for anyone to find any part when needed. The majority of the parts have arrived which made this easier. For my thesis I want to include pictures of all the different parts so I took pictures of them all except the adapter plate and shaft coupler which haven’t arrive yet. I did get some good news about those parts, which was that had been shipped today. Although Wilderness EV was a week late it was still good news to know that the last remaining parts would be arriving soon.

Climbing the Grand Teton this weekend was one of the most amazing experiences of my life and it was a dream come true. I have waited over 7 years to come back to the Grand and make another attempt at summiting it. It was one of the most dangerous things I have done in my life but it was worth the risk.

We woke on Saturday and began the hike to the Moraine camping area which is at an altitude of 10,800 ft. Our starting elevation was 6,732 ft. We hiked at a steady pace without taken any breaks until we reached the meadows at 9,400 ft. It was a very beautiful hike to the meadows and from the meadows we had to hike up very steep switch backs that led us to the Moraine’s. We got to camp and relaxed the rest of the day knowing that the next day was going to be long and strenuous. We all went to sleep early because we were waking up at 3:30 am to begin the summit attempt.

We all woke up quickly when the alarm went off at 3:30 AM  and got ready for our summit attempt. After hiking for several hours through the early morning we got to the technical part of the climb where we roped up. We were very exposed for much of the technical climb with 1000 ft drops less than a foot from where we were climbing. It was scary but I kept thinking about the summit and how much I wanted to make it to the top. We got to the summit (13,770 ft) at 12 PM and the weather could not of been better. It was blue skies all around us and there was barely any wind at the top. After we sat on top for about 20 minutes we began the dangerous part of hiking down the mountain which is when most accidents occur. It was gruelling walking back down with  after summiting because at that point we had be hiking for over 9 hours and we had to descend over 7,000 feet of elevation. We got back to the car safely at 8:30 PM and we all were exhausted. In all we were up for over 21 hours and all we wanted to do was sleep. It was one of the best experiences of my life and having my brother there to experience it with me meant so much to me.