BHS students apply ‘Jazz Engineering’ to solve the planet’s many problems.

Haakon Ostenson pushes up his welding goggles for a clear look at the future of transportation.

“This is my contribution to stopping climate change,” said the Bainbrige High School senior, kneeling next to “Django,” an electric car he helped design and build over the last year.

With three wheels, cherry red frame, easy chair cockpit and front-mounted pedals, the home-made vehicle looks like a cross between a dune buggy and a recumbent bicycle. It can hit 25 miles per hour, haul over 300 pounds and cover much of the island on a single charge.

The pedals are supplemental, making Django an odd sort of “human-electric” hybrid.

For Ostenson, working on Django fuses his mechanical aptitude with a growing concern for the environment. It’s a winning combination, he said, that will prove increasingly useful when earth-friendly transportation is no longer optional.

“We’ll be forced to change over the next 50 years,” he said. “But what I’m learning has already paid off.”

Ostenson is one of three apprentices crowded into Barry Griffin’s Grow Avenue garage. Teeming with shop tools, welding implements, steel piping and machine parts, the garage and backyard have served for three years as Griffin’s school of “Jazz Engineering.”

“It’s a new method of inventing that combines jazz exercises with mechanical engineering,” said Griffin, a Harvard-educated marine engineering consultant. “Really good engineering design groups function like jazz groups, where there’s a free flow of ideas and a democracy of ideas.”

This free flow has flooded Griffin’s backyard, where ideas on agricultural productivity, irrigation, large-scale composting and wind power have consumed every corner.

“What we’re trying to do is develop systems that are low cost and allow us to live lightly on the earth,” Griffin said. “So many people try to buy the solution. But, really, they are the solution.”

The yard’s 20 raised garden beds, each about 100 square feet, were installed as part of a project with a former high school student who wanted to find out how much produce was needed to support a small family.

The irrigation system, which pipes rooftop rainwater, is under development with BHS senior Kaza Ansley.

She aims to cycle the water back uphill through a windmill-powered pump. Senior Carl Herman spends many of his afternoons heading up the garden’s experimental composting operation.

“A lot of the material we use and dispose of could be reused,” Herman said. “But it’s not. A lot of food that could add nutrients to the soil is sent to landfills where it just sits.”

Herman’s compost bin is a virtual chemistry experiment. He’s testing nitrogen and carbon levels, investigating the rate at which certain materials dry and tracking bacterial growth.

“A lot of websites say what types of composting are best, but there’s not a lot of testing on why its best,” he said. “Hopefully, with our test, we’ll find a better way to compost.”

Herman is putting his knowledge to work as part of a campaign through the Environmental Service Corps to get his school’s cafeteria to compost food scraps. Eventually, he’d like to design a program to get Winslow restaurants to compost organic waste. Island Health Foods and Mud Puddle Cafe are already on board, donating heaps of vegetable bits and coffee grounds for the project.

Compost conditions are not quite optimal yet, Herman said, leading Griffin to initiate a jazzified brainstorming session – one of Jazz Engineering’s core exercises.

He throws out a word and the apprentices answer with the first idea or object that comes to mind. “Factory” leads to “belt” and ends with “flamingo.” The collection of words sparks a discussion about improving the compost bin though increased air flow.

The concept for Django came out of a similar word association game three years ago.

“We just started throwing out words: dentist, chair, lettuce, dirt, skiing. So we took that. We got the design of the car, where you lean back like in a dentist’s chair.”

The other words led to tangents on how to harness gravity and reduce friction through the vehicle’s design.

“Having a body of knowledge – whether it be medicine or engineering – can be constraining,” said Griffin. “It becomes your master. But inventors have to be a little irresponsible to be creative. We ‘free associate’ to get beyond our constraints.”

His love for creative ideas is why Griffin devotes his afternoons to working with high school students.

Their outlook on engineering provides Griffin fresh perspective and renewed passion for the field.

“Kids are freer,” he said. “This kind of thinking comes natural to them. Look at who invented the microprocessor and the integrated circuit. They were 23, 24. A 23-year-old doesn’t know any better. They’re not yet constrained. They’ll ask ‘why are we doing things this way?’”

Students typically learn about Griffin’s after-school apprentice program through advanced level science teachers.

Some of his previous apprentices are currently studying engineering at the University of Washington and Washington State University.

Ostenson has stuck with the program for about a year, where he’s focused primarily on the electric car. He’s learned plenty of technical skills and mechanical know-how, but key lessons involved patience and determination.

“I really learned to stick to things and get the job done correctly,” he said. “But there’s a lot of stuff. Just working with Barry, you learn so much through experience. I can’t tell you how much I’ve learned.”

Griffin nodded at his apprentice.

“It goes both ways,” he said.

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Earth Day

Barry Griffin and his apprentices display the “Django” electric car from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. at City Hall as part of Earth Day celebrations on Saturday.

Other events include:

• Helpline House Plant Sale, 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. at 282 Knechtel Way. Sale includes vegetable starts, kids’ activities and expert gardening advice. Call 842-7621.

• Bainbridge Farmers Market, 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the green near City Hall. Market includes locally grown foods and hand-crafted products.

• Non-Motorized Earth Day Parade, starts at 9 a.m. from Ericksen Avenue and ends at Town & Country Market. Call 855-4646.

• Bainbridge Parks Celebration of Service, 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at various parks. Volunteer crews will clean up parks, remove invasive plants and improve trails. Call 842-2306.

• Pritchard Park clean-up, 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Weed Warriors, the Association of Bainbridge Communities and the Interfaith Council lead a clean-up of this south Eagle Harbor beach. Free Earth Day T-shirts to the first batch of volunteers. Event includes training in plant identification and weed removal techniques. Bring pruning tools and gloves. Call 855-0911.

• “Energy Central,” 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. at City Hall. Event includes exhibits of renewable energy sources, energy efficient transportation and energy saving products. Olympic Biofuels will present a forum on biodiesel at 10:30 a.m. Beverly Duperly Boos will present a family-oriented discussion based on Al Gore’s documentary “An Inconvenient Truth” at 11:30 a.m. Sustainable Bainbridge will discuss energy savings at home at 1:15 p.m. Bainbridge Island Energy solutions will present information on solar-power technologies for home and business use. Call 855-4893.

• Town & Country’s 8th Annual Earth Day Fair, 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. at Town & country Market. Celebration includes organic chicken barbecue, kids activities and tables with information from various environmental groups.

• Fairy Dell Trail ivy-pull, 2 to 4 p.m. on Frey Avenue, near Battle Point Park’s north parking lot. Volunteers will remove invasive plants and learn about backyard ivy irradiation. Bring pruning tools and gloves. Call 842-3412.

• Global Warming: Personal Perspectives, 7 to 8:30 p.m. at City Hall. Moderated discussion about climate change.