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Meet Emily Ransdell
Iceland 2025 – TGP Scholarship
Delaware Technical Community College
Energy Management
Graduation Year: 2025
“Being able to visit a place you’ve always admired is incredible, but when you also get to learn and explore the field you’re interested in, it exceeds any and all expectations.”
About Emily
My name is Emily and I am a second year student at Delaware Technical Community College studying Energy Management. I have always been passionate about our environment and preserving the natural beauty of the planet for years to come. Hearing that a lot of our harmful practices come from the generation and use of energy, I set out to dedicate my studies to finding alternative and clean ways to provide energy to our people.
During an internship at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, I heard about TGP from an alumni who suggested the Iceland Program to me. After looking into the program some more, I found that it aligned with my current studies and future goals. I was inspired by hearing stories from program alumni and knew that I would be able to build my skill set and contribute to my growth by participating in TGP.
I was very excited to be awarded a scholarship for this program. Being able to study abroad has always been a dream of mine and having this assistance from TGP was able to help make that dream come true. I signed up for the program very early. I was eager and excited to go on this trip and had a smooth enrollment process. The only challenge I faced was having to wait so long! Otherwise, the resources provided by TGP made for an easy process. Especially things like the packing list, which was extremely helpful to knowing what to bring on the trip!
Takeaways and Learning Moments
I wasn’t entirely sure what to expect before coming to the program, but I knew it would be a great adventure. I had always wanted to visit Iceland and this program was the best way to do that. Being able to visit a place you’ve always admired is incredible, but when you also get to learn and explore the field you’re interested in, it exceeds any and all expectations.
I found that this trip was the right amount of lectures and hands on learning, which can be a hard balance to achieve. I thoroughly enjoyed hearing from experts in the area during lectures, but found the most effective learning to be on the adventures and activities. One of my favorite learning moments was hiking up to the Solheimajokull glacier and learning all about its history and impacts on the area. Not only was it cool (no pun intended) to be on top of a glacier, but learning about it while being up there added a depth to the experience.
When my parents picked me up from the airport the first thing I said was, “That was the coolest thing I’ve ever done.” Everything about this program was incredible and I am so grateful for the opportunity to have been a part of it. I have a newfound admiration for Iceland and their renewable energy efforts. The biggest takeaway from this program would be my expanded skill set and knowledge about clean and alternative sources of energy. This new knowledge will be incredibly helpful in my future academic and career endeavors. Having the chance to explore this beautiful country and learn about efforts that are important to me has been a priceless experience.
Global experiences like TGP are important for underrepresented students to experience because they provide incredible opportunities to everyone. Programs like these, give a wealth of knowledge and experience that is hard to find elsewhere. Their support to underrepresented students is important to the development of the sustainability field and the widespread efforts to protect our planet and people by inspiring more young minds to develop creative and impactful solutions.
Capstone Project
My group did our capstone project about harnessing the wind energy potential of the city of Chicago. Dubbed “The Windy City,” Chicago has wind patterns and tall buildings that are great for installing wind turbines to produce clean energy. We came up with this idea while brainstorming projects around wind energy, a topic we were all interested in. Then, we looked into the wind characteristics of the city, picked an example building, and ran a cost/energy analysis of installing turbines on this building.
We found that they would receive significant energy savings from this investment and the simple payback of installing the wind turbines would be about 9 years! While we only looked at one building during our project, our company would be the forefront of wind energy installation in the city. The main challenges we faced were mostly involved in the cost structure of our company, but having a specific building to focused on helped overcome this and show the feasibility of our project.
Emily’s advice for new GREENies:
Don’t let those barriers stop you from having an incredible experience like TGP! There are a multitude of resources and scholarships both in TGP and externally. Do a bit of research, apply for as many opportunities as you can, and know that you’re investing in your future!
To Those That Made My Scholarship Possible…
I just want to thank everyone from TGP who made this trip and scholarship possible! All your efforts and work is greatly appreciated and this will be a trip that I will look back on fondly forever.
