Ioannis Kaliakatsos, Ph.D.

Emmanouel Antonidakis, Ph.D.

Technological Educational Institute of Crete, Greece/ Department of Electronics

Tel: +30 821 28188

E-mail: gliodak@teihan.gr

Abstract: The island of Crete, Greece has been recently arised as a region where wide exploitation of its renewable energy resources (especially solar and wind energy) is taking place. The aim of this paper is to present the methodology adopted for the educational material and the use of Telematics for the establishment of a Distance Education Program on renewable energy resources by the Technological Educational Institute of Iraklion, Greece. Emphasis is given to the approach followed to cover the need for distance education and training of scientific and technical personnel involved in other sectors of economy (agriculture, tourism, etc.) where application of the renewable energy resources is foreseen. Finally, the coordinated efforts of the academic community as well as of local authorities, working towards the formation of the Information Society, striving for the sustainable development in Crete are presented.

The socioeconomic development of the island of Crete, Greece has been slowed down because of the unbalance between demand and supply of the electrical energy. This is due to the geographical isolation of Crete from the mainland (thus leading to a dependency on oil for electricity generation with the associated problems for the environment) and the development rates of the various economic activities. Taking into account the distribution of the GNP of Crete (see Fig. 1) and the consumption of electricity according to use (see Fig. 2), the Region of Crete aims for the implementation of a regional energy strategy and action plan in pursuit of establishing Crete as a preferential area for extensive applications of Renewable Energy Sources (RES) in cooperation with academic and research institutes of the island as well as with local authorities.

Thus, in order to fulfil the above mentioned policy and respond to real market needs (as evidenced by the already installed RES plants in Crete), the Technological Educational Institute (TEI) of Iraklion/ Department of Electronics (Chania) is working towards the pilot implementation of a distance education program on RES in collaboration with the Wind Energy Laboratory of TEI of Iraklion, the TEI of Patras/Solar Energy Laboratory (mainland of Greece), the Technical University of Crete (Chania) and KYDON (a TV broadcaster situated in Chania) with the financial aid of the European Union Support Framework/Program of the Greek Ministry of Education. This paper will address implementation issues of the distance education program as well as other telematic applications taking place in Crete towards the sustainable development of the island. The paper is organized as follows: The next Section gives an overview of the RES exploitation potential and current penetration in Crete. In Section 3, a technical description of the distance education system under development along with the the guidelines driving such an implementation, is presented. Section 4 describes in brief the introduction of telematic applications in Crete towards the formation of the Information Society. Finally, Section 5 underlines the activities planned after the pilot implementation of the distance education program and its incorporation in the educational program of TEI of Iraklion.

According to techno-economic studies and the data presented in [1] and [2], Crete is an ideal place for a wide exploitation of RES, in particular that of wind energy, solar energy, biomass and small hydropower (SHP). As it concerns wind energy, many wind parks providing hundreds of MW could be established; at least 100MW of which with a highly cost-efficient way. Solar energy could contribute a total of around 4525 TJ/y without considering the installation of photovoltaic and solar thermal plants. A total of 15909 TJ/y of thermal production is estimated that can be provided by biomass (exploitation of urban, agricultural and forest wastes). Finally, the ten more promising sites for installation of SHP systems could contribute 3.2 MW with an expected energy production of the order of 12500 MWh/y. At this point the possibility for the costruction of reversible storage hydroelectric plants working on daily basis (pumping during the night and producing energy during the peak demand) should be stressed. However, as the installed power of the reversible plant must be sufficient (at least of the order of 30 MW), one should take into account technical and economic data as well as issues concerning the future development of the island.

When considering the installed power plants using RES as well as the plants to be in operation in the near future, the situation is as follows:

• Two wind parks of 10 MW and 5.1 MW respectively are already in operation, while four other parks are under construction.
• Photovoltaic plants of 500 KW totally are in operation, while a 5 MW photovoltaic park (the greater all over the world) is being planned.
• Two SHP plants of the order of some hundreds of KW are in operation, while a total of 6 MW is expected till 2005.

It is, thus, evident that bringing RES exploitation in Crete at the forefront will contribute positively to the environmental protection and will lead to a more cost-effective operation of companies of the primary (agriculture), secondary (SMEs of Crete) and tertiary (especially tourism) sector. Therefore, there exists the need for well educated and trained scientific and technical personnel of various educational backgrounds (in electrical and electronic engineering, in construction and mechanical engineering, agricultural engineering, etc.) that will be involved in activities related to RES. The aforementioned need is expected to be fulfilled by the distance education program under development, based on prior activities of the participating partners. As it concerns TEI of Iraklion, the Department of Electronics has designed and is technically supervising a hybrid (exploiting solar and wind energy) power plant on behalf of an agricultural company. As well as, the Wind Energy Laboratory along with its training activities is involved in wind parks system design, software development for wind parks and feasibility studies, etc.

3. The Distance Learning Service

Taking into account the general characteristics of all the constituent parts of a distance education system, a set of objectives/requirements were derived for the implementation of the system under consideration. These objectives/requirements include:

1. Adoption of the appropriate learning/training model: Except the traditional objectivist approach (where a certain amount of knowledge should be transferred as efficiently as possible onto the learner), we have adopted the cooperative learning model and the cognitive approach (see Ref. 3) in order to facilitate maximum exchange of the experience of learners already working on RES facilities and learners of various educational and technical backgrounds and experience who may in the future be involved in this field.
2. Creation of an integrated and flexible educational environment: A major requirement was to create an integrated and flexible environment by the establishment of remote classrooms using ISDN technology, the access to Internet as well as by television broadcasting of selected presentations/courses, usable either at the facilities of TEI of Iraklion or at the learner’s work and home.
3. Cost reduction: This is due to the fact of a continuing trend to reduction of public funding per student and the cost associated to the traditional group training adopted by the companies. Thus, the budget constraints for the pilot implementation as well as for future provision of the distance education program on RES guided the overall system design methodology, especially when considering the communications infrastructure of Crete which presents regional differences.
4. Dissemination of RES potential and use: In order to promote the advantages of RES and to sensitize citizens and energy users in Crete, educational material not requiring a strong technical background will be transmitted by the KYDON TV broadcaster.

Based on the above objectives/requirements, we set up the system shown in Fig.3, consisting of one classroom (see Fig.4)at every educational project partner linked by ISDN lines to the Department of Electronics of TEI of Iraklion, the latter also linked to KYDON TV by a wireless link. In such a way the following three basic types of distance learning sessions are being experimented upon:

1. Interactive Remote Lectures: According to this master-slave scenario, students will receive audio and video from the lecturer as well as other teaching support material (data, graphics, still images, remote pointer, whiteboard, etc.). The Audio/Video Management Unit takes care of the control of the various audio/video presentation equipment (microphones, loudspeakers, CCD cameras, video-projector screens) and is connected to a workstation where technical databases for use during teaching reside. The ISDN interface incorporates multipoint support for audio/video/data using H.320/T.120 protocol.
2. Archive Lectures: By means of this service, learners will be allowed to access a lecture database and attend it at their own convenience and pace. These lectures could be offered on workstations at the facilities of TEI of Iraklion as well as by downloading through Internet. It is also our purpose to enhance the content of the lectures by postprocessing, for example lectures annotated with frequently asked questions as if the instructor were answering them in real time. Furthermore, some lectures/presentations broadcasted by KYDON TV are to be provided, though without any possibility of interaction.
3. Remote Training: It will basically be carried out in an off-line mode, including remote access of hypertext courseware through the Internet, supervision of the students by the expert in each field of the RES education program as well as groupware such as discussions and joint studies.

The development and implementation of the distance education program on RES can be seen as part of a wide range of demonstration projects and research activities that are taking place in Crete towards the formation of Information Society, by means of exploiting local resources and striving for the sustainable development of the island. In particular, the Region of Crete through its Regional Development Strategy Plan is supporting initiatives addressing the development and provision of advanced information and communication services and infrastructure as well as their accessibility, affordability and usage, finally leading to the evolution of Crete as a major Research Centre and Telecommunications Node in southeastern Mediterranean area. These aforementioned initiatives are implemented by academic institutions, local authorities and SMEs of Crete and contribute significantly to the socioeconomic integration of the island by exploiting the economic and employment growth opportunities offered by the Information Society.

In the framework set above, some of the ongoing telematic applications which will have major impact in the near future include:

1. The development of a Fire Detection Radio Network which will contribute to the protection of the environment of the island.
2. The introduction of an electronic commerce system supporting the activities of the tourism sector by the involvement of all players of the sector.
3. The implementation of a regional Health Telematics System to provide an integrated environment for health care delivery, medical training and consultation across the island (see Ref. 4). The system takes advantage of the increasing capacity of terrestrial and mobile communications networks and the development of advanced telemedicine services to provide everyone with effective health care and support remote consultation with health care professionals in specialized centers, district and regional hospitals. In particular, the TEI of Iraklion is involved in wireless systems development for the provision of emergency health care services.

After the pilot implementation of the distance education program, one or more components of the distance education service (i.e. the distance learning sessions, the communication scenarios, the courseware and the teaching support), could be exploited with the appropriate modifications by the participating partners. The latter is of particular importance for the TEI of Iraklion which is in the process of establishing the new Department of Tropical and Subtropical Engineers. It will be collocated with the Department of Electronics in Chania covering a variety of disciplines such as Energy Production Systems, Agriculture, Construction Engineering, Natural Resources Management, Environmental Management and Protection and Finance, etc. It aims to the education/training of students in order to be able to manage natural and technical processes in a unified manner and who may originate from countries facing similar problems as Greece.

Highly related to the above statements that will be examined after the pilot implementation considering also the associated cost, is the possibility of incorporating satellite technology in the network infrastructure for distant provision of the RES education program. This will justify the financial viability of the program as the interested persons and/or companies may or are usually to rural areas or areas with moderately dense populations.

Another issue, that is to be examined at the end of the pilot implementation phase, is that of the quality of the distance education program. In particular, aside Quality of Services (QoS) parameters related to efficient communication of different media (see Section 4), other aspects should include the teaching methods, the user-friendliness of the educational environment, the student-learner interactivity, the tangible and intangible costs and benefits and the relationship between learning and teaching objectives as well as other subjective parameters. In such a way the different educational agents (learners, academics, tutors, administrative staff) would cooperate constructively towards a distance education program that will satisfy the required expectations at a low cost.

As a conclusion, it is expected that the distance education on RES will contribute significantly to the exploitation of local natural and human resources and will further promote the use of telematics in Crete towards the achievement of sustainable development.