A Chinese wind turbine manufacturer today announced the opening of a research-and-development facility in Raleigh in anticipation for demand for its offshore turbines in this country.

Ming Yang Wind Power plans to conduct research on lowering the cost of offshore wind power, which remains one of the most expensive forms of renewable energy. But the company isn’t limiting its U.S. ambitions to research, hoping eventually to establish a factory to assemble and ship its gear to giant wind farms as they are built.

Offshore wind farms use turbines that can be more than twice as large as land-based turbines; they have to be built to withstand hurricanes, require boats for routine maintenance, and depend on miles of undersea cable to connect to power grids.

No offshore wind farms have been built in this country, though a several are under development along the East Coast, including one proposed for offshore North Carolina.

The Upper Room Christian Academy Annual Fund Tournament will be held at 8:30 a.m. June 4 at the Lonnie Poole Golf Course on N.C. State's Centennial Campus in Raleigh.

The entry fee is $85. Contact John Amanchukwu at 919-829-6199, or visit www.urcafund.org.

*** Find more golf tournaments and other charity events, plus summer camps and leagues, in the expanded online edition of the Play! Recreational Sports Calendar. ***

One stakeholder expects Red Hat to remain in Raleigh.

The software company is considering its options for new space in Durham, Atlanta, Austin and downtown Raleigh, setting off a frenzy among elected officials, economic boosters and real-estate developers. Another option would be to expand its existing headquarters on N.C. State's Centennial Campus.

"If I were a betting man, I bet they'll stay," said Ira R. Weiss, dean of N.C. State's Poole College of Management.

Of course, that's only one man's opinion. But he has more than a passing interest in the matter.

Raleigh Mayor Charles Meeker said today the city has had discussions with software company Red Hat about the company's need for more space.

"They've been in touch with the state and the city and the county," Meeker said. "We're naturally very interested in responding to any questions they have."

Meeker said the city's discussions with Red Hat have been going on for the last several years.

They've likely taken on new urgency of late.

Red Hat's growth has led it to explore out-of-state options for 300,000 square feet of office space. Officials with the Linux software business have looked at office space about that size in Atlanta and Austin, Texas.

The company currently occupies more than 188,000 square feet at its headquarters on N.C. State University's Centennial Campus.
 

One of France's leading business schools moved a step closer to opening a Triangle campus with the announcement of a real-estate lease Tuesday.

The Skema business school will lease 18,000 square feet for classrooms and offices at N.C. State University's Centennial Campus in anticipation of the first 250 students starting classes in January.

Skema plans to develop a business program here to accommodate as many as 600 foreign students. The classes will be taught in English; Skema will use its own faculty and administrative staff.

The French institute has campuses in China and Morocco, as well as three sites in France.

Skema announced its plans for a U.S. campus in May. The school was formed in 2009 with the merger of two French business schools.

The lease was signed between Skema and Craig Davis Properties, the Raleigh developer that built the two vacant buildings Skema will occupy. Skema will arrange for off-campus housing for its faculty, staff and students.

ABB, a Cary company that makes power transmission and distribution system, said today it will create 130 jobs in Wake and Mecklenburg counties over the next two years.

The bulk of the jobs, 100, will be in Huntersvillle where ABB will build a new manufacturing facility.

ABB currently employs about 775 people in North Carolina, including 550 in the Triangle.

About 250 people work at the company’s North American headquarters in Cary and another 300 at its offices on N.C. State’s Centennial Campus.

State officials awarded ABB $2.149 million in incentives today if the company meets its job creation requirements.

N.C. State is building a new chancellor's residence on the shores of Lake Raleigh, over on Centennial Campus.

(Here's a map, if you can't figure out where it will be...)

And thanks to this website from NCSU's communications office, you can follow its progress.

(Photo: N.C. State Alumni Association)

Original designs called for a massive, 12,000-square-foot home at a price tag of $5 million; but those plans were scaled back considerably before the final project was approved.

The house is slated to be done in the spring.

Hans Conrad spend his days fishing, or golfing, or doing whatever it is that retired engineering professors do.

To that, he says : Bah!

Conrad, 88, has not been able to give up the research life. So there he still is, in his basement laboratory on N.C. State's Centennial Campus, continuing to chart new paths.

Oh. And he works for free.

Conrad, officially retired since 1993, still sometimes pays his research assistants himself.

Jay Price has the story.

N.C. State's Centennial Campus has a new building.

The university has opened the Keystone Science Center, a privately developed two-story facility housing labs and a handful of corporate tenants. The 72,000-square-foot building at the corner of Varsity Drive and Main Campus Drive was developed in much the same way that previous Centennial Campus public/private collaborations have.

The building will be managed by the Keystone Corporation, a Raleigh-based real estate development firm.

Corporate tenants for the building include WebAssign, Pentair Pool & Spa, and All Systems Broadband. The building will also house the Future Renewable Electric Energy Delivery and Management (FREEDM Systems Center) and the Biomanufacturing Training and Education Center (BTEC).

Approximately 15,000-square-feet of space will be occupied by the FREEDM Center, which is the first National Science Foundation-funded research center to focus on changing this country’s power grid by integrating it with new, alternative energy technologies, such as wind and solar.

The center is partnering with universities, industry and national laboratories in 28 states and nine countries, and it is being supported by an initial five-year $18.5 million grant from NSF, along with an additional $10 million institutional support and industry membership fees.

Triangle golfers from Raleigh, Durham, Morrisville and Apex on
Wednesday were among the 23 competitors to advance to the 50th N.C.
Amateur Championship from sectional qualifying hosted by the Lonnie
Poole Golf Course on N.C. State's Centennial Campus in Raleigh.

Henry Zaytoun III of Raleigh led the Triangle contingent, shooting a
3-under-par 69 and sharing second place with Daniel Claytor of Rocky
Mount. They finished two shots behind event winner Harold Varner III of
Gastonia, who shot a 67.