Boca teen’s prototype harnesses ocean energy
and wins her a ticket to the White House
Hannah Herbst, at an FAU lab, shows her floatable prototype designed to provide
a power source by using untapped energy from ocean currents. She won the Discovery Education
3M Young Scientist Challenge for her work.
Tim Stepien/The Coastal Star
Hannah shows her creation to President Barack Obama at the White House Science Fair.
Photo provided
By Lucy Lazarony
Two years ago, Hannah Herbst was on a boat in the Boca inlet that was rocking back and forth due to the power of the ocean’s currents.
She wondered at the time why no one had collected this power.
So she decided to do it.
“I started to develop my prototypes late in my seventh-grade year,” says Hannah, 15, who just finished her freshman year at Florida Atlantic University High School.
With help from a 3M scientist, whose company sponsors the annual science challenge, Hannah created an ocean energy prototype that aims to provide a stable power source to developing countries by using untapped energy from ocean currents. The scientist she was paired with is Jeffrey Emslander, a chemical engineer at 3M who works at a Minneapolis lab. The two communicated via Skype.
The prototype they came up with is suited toward those who live near the ocean, as Hannah’s family does.
“It’s for anybody who lives near moving water,” she says.
Hannah explains her prototype this way:
“The ocean currents spin the Pelton wheels that are attached to a generator.
“The generator transfers the energy. It doesn’t create it. It transfers it because energy doesn’t get created or destroyed. It’s one of Newton’s laws.”
In October, Hannah’s project won the 2015 Discovery Education 3M Young Scientist Challenge.
Her idea and hard work took her all the way to the White House.
On April 13, she participated in President Barack Obama’s sixth annual White House Science Fair, with other top science, technology, engineering and math students from around the country.
How was her trip to the White House?
“It was so cool,” Hannah says. “We saw all the rooms I watch on TV. It was pretty amazing.”
And she was the very first student the president talked to at the science fair.
“There were 40 kids displaying but he came to six,” Hannah says. “He said, ‘How are you?’ ”
They spoke for about 10 minutes. What did the president think of her ocean energy prototype?
“He said it was cool,” Hannah recalls. “And he said he thought it would be a pretty good solution to the energy crisis.”
Did she take a selfie with the president after their chat?
“I did not take a selfie with him, but I got a selfie with Bill Nye the Science Guy,” Hannah admits.
The next stop for the budding inventer is the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair in Arizona. “It’s the largest pre-collegiate science fair in the world,” she says.
Where did Hanah get her great love of science and innovation?
“In the seventh grade, my parents (Julie and Joel Herbst of coastal Boca Raton) took me to a science camp here at FAU. That’s where my love of science was born,” Hannah says. (Her dad is assistant dean of the pre-college schools and educational programs at FAU).
“It was a camp where we built robots.
“It was really empowering, and I began to do more stuff that I couldn’t do before.”
She has a younger brother, Max, 13, who is also interested in science.
Comments