Local and state-level civic leaders as well as community members gathered in the main concourse of the University of Toledo’s Scott Park Campus for Energy and Innovation yesterday afternoon to hear Ohio Governor Ted Strickland announce the state’s plan to establish an Ohio Hub of Innovation and Opportunity in the Toledo region.

The hub, which has been named the Northwest Ohio Solar Energy Innovation Hub, is based on economic and research-oriented partnerships between regional education institutions and leaders in the private sector. The list of education institutions includes UT, Bowling Green State University, Owens Community College, Penta Career Center, Terra Community College and Northwest State Community College.

According to a press release from the governor’s office, “Hubs are designed to leverage a region’s resources and investments to attract clusters of connected businesses, encourage new investments and an influx of talented workers and help to create new opportunities to grow jobs and develop Ohio’s key industries.”

The hub will be supported by a $250,000 grant from the Ohio Department of Development. The ODD states that the hub’s key objectives are to enhance research capacity, scholarship, technology development, and commercialization in the solar energy sector; to develop an integrated marketing plan for the Northwest Ohio Solar Sector; to follow through on “University City” comprehensive land use plan; to ensure minority involvement in the development of the solar energy sector; to connect the hub through an innovation network; and to establish strategies for gaining financial support for the innovation system.

“Being named a hub is more than a point of civic pride; it’s a proclamation. It’s a proclamation from the state that we stand squarely beside the virgin solar industry in this region,” Strickland said. “It’s a promise from the state of Ohio that we will provide seed money for planning and development assistance to disburse sustained growth.”

Strickland also noted that state’s decision to establish a hub for solar energy in the region is a state pledge to work with the region to further the connections between northwest Ohio colleges and universities, research institutions and solar companies.

Economic revival

The ceremony addressed the opportunity for industrial and economic renewal with which the solar energy hub presents the northwest Ohio region.

“You are sitting or perhaps standing at exactly, precisely the middle of the Rust Belt. You are sitting or standing at precisely the middle of the hope belt. We are going to pull out of this with the leadership of Michael Bell, Governor Strickland and Pete Gerken,” UT President Lloyd Jacobs, who served as master of ceremonies, told the crowd.

Jacobs said public-private partnerships are the most important aspect of regional economic development.

“Partnerships between universities and the private industrial sector may be the most important thing in our future. We believe that Northwest Ohio is a leader in this regard. I believe the University of Toledo is a leader in working to build these kinds of partnerships,” Jacobs said.

According to Rick Stansley, chair of the University of Toledo Innovation Enterprises, the most promising partner for the solar energy hub is Dow Corning, a joint venture company comprised of Dow Industrial and Corning Incorporated and headquartered in Midland, Michigan.

“We are working right now on the submission of a Department of Energy proposal that is going to be up to $93 million in research activity over a five-year period,” Stansley said.

Stansley said the DOE submission will focus specifically on research in photovoltaics, an area of renewable energy involving solar cells to generate power.

“The Hub’s designation really is going to provide opportunity for us to bring some people here who have expertise in the various areas that are identified in the proposal itself,” Stansley said.

“As a matter of sound economic policies, we are committed to helping our cities and our regions do more of what they do best. Northwest Ohio has everything that’s needed to attract and to support clusters of connected solar businesses into investments,” Strickland said.

UT-BG partnership

One of the main highlights of the solar energy hub, championed by those individuals and groups involved in the hub, is the partnership between UT and BGSU.

According to the Ohio Department of Development, UT and BG have been designated as central actors in the hub because they have been actively working with northwest Ohio industries and capitalizing on several photoscience research investments throughout the state, including the Wright Center for Photovoltaics Innovation and Commercialization and Ohio Research Scholars Northwest Ohio Innovators in Thin Film Photovoltaics.

“I think that our universities are community-owned assets. They have to be utilized in a way that benefits the community and region. I think it’s an example of how a collaborative effort really can benefit the community. We see immediate results as a result of that activity,” Stansley said, regarding the UT-BG partnership.

BGSU President Carol Cartwright said that the solar energy hub is all about collaboration intended to build upon the northwest Ohio region’s success in solar and alternative energy and bringing the byproducts of the partnerships to the marketplace.

“It’s in our DNA to seek out people studying similar areas and with similar research interests, so that we can share information and find solutions to problems,” Cartwright said. “Our collaboration between BG and UT is no exception, and our region benefits because of it.”

In an interview after the announcement ceremony, Toledo Mayor Mike Bell said that, without regional partnerships, northwest Ohio will not be able to move forward toward regional success.

“That these two fine universities are working as partners…is a great thing. We’re going to turn around northwest Ohio, but we can’t do it being silos,” Bell said in his address to the audience.

“We’ve got two different universities working together in actually two different counties. We’ve got the port involved. We’ve got a number of different business associates living somewhere in the Toledo area, some of them in Perrysburg, and they’re all trying to work together,” Bell said.