Caterpillar Delivers 3 Generators for St. Thomas University Microgrid Research Center
As microgrid deployment grows at the edge of the troubled U.S. utility grid, research into on-site power and microgrid control technologies will also expand within some of the nation’s energy-focused universities.
St. Thomas University in Minnesota is building a new building for its Center for Microgrid Research facility on the St. Paul campus. The construction work, led by Ryan Companies, is moving forward with work successfully putting up lower level, first and second floor walls for the generation facility.
In the past week, on-site power equipment manufacturer Caterpillar Inc. delivered three 500-kW generators for future research work at the St. Thomas campus.
The CAT generators, according to Mahmoud Kalaban, the St. Thomas professor who also is director the university’s Center for Microgrid Research, are “key assets that will power our expanded research into distributed energy resources, grid resiliency, and workforce development,” Kalaban noted in a LinkedIn post about the construction progress. “These generators will be integrated into our growing microgrid infrastructure, supporting cutting-edge research and hands-on education.”
Two years ago, a $5.4 million grant from the state of Minnesota empowered Kalaban and his team at the Center for Microgrid Research to expand their work.
The St. Thomas Center for Microgrid Research announced earlier this year it was partnering with EV charging technology firm Bright.Green to build a new microgrid facility after receiving a $2 million investment to support next-gen distributed energy and artificial intelligence (AI)-ready research.
Work on the first $2 million microgrid at the University of St. Thomas started nearly a decade ago. The new partnership with Bright.Green gives the next microgrid project a new focus with cutting edge digitalization utilizing AI.
The St. Thomas Center for Microgrid Research was first established in 2014 when the School of Engineering was awarded a $1.5 million grant from utility Xcel Energy’s renewable development fund to build the microgrid research and test center.
The rise of cloud-based data center and AI computing capacity needs is pushing the growth of both distributed energy and future off-grid power solutions such as microgrids. Both Grand View Research and Mordor Intelligence are forecasting more than 17% in the annual growth rate for microgrid deployment, resulting in a global market value of between $50 billion and $100 billion.
The Microgrid Knowledge Conference will focus on all of the key drivers in this deployment growth when it happens next May in Orlando. The call for session ideas and speakers at MGK 2026 is still open.
About the Author
Rod Walton, Microgrid Knowledge Managing Editor
Managing Editor
For Microgrid Knowledge editorial inquiries, please contact Managing Editor Rod Walton at [email protected].
I’ve spent the last 15 years covering the energy industry as a newspaper and trade journalist. I was an energy writer and business editor at the Tulsa World before moving to business-to-business media at PennWell Publishing, which later became Clarion Events, where I covered the electric power industry. I joined Endeavor Business Media in November 2021 to help launch EnergyTech, one of the company’s newest media brands. I joined Microgrid Knowledge in July 2023.
I earned my Bachelors degree in journalism from the University of Oklahoma. My career stops include the Moore American, Bartlesville Examiner-Enterprise, Wagoner Tribune and Tulsa World, all in Oklahoma . I have been married to Laura for the past 33-plus years and we have four children and one adorable granddaughter. We want the energy transition to make their lives better in the future.
Microgrid Knowledge and EnergyTech are focused on the mission critical and large-scale energy users and their sustainability and resiliency goals. These include the commercial and industrial sectors, as well as the military, universities, data centers and microgrids. The C&I sectors together account for close to 30 percent of greenhouse gas emissions in the U.S.
Many large-scale energy users such as Fortune 500 companies, and mission-critical users such as military bases, universities, healthcare facilities, public safety and data centers, shifting their energy priorities to reach net-zero carbon goals within the coming decades. These include plans for renewable energy power purchase agreements, but also on-site resiliency projects such as microgrids, combined heat and power, rooftop solar, energy storage, digitalization and building efficiency upgrades.