NEOSHO, Mo. • A new $7 million-plus renewable energy center at Crowder College in southwestern Missouri is nearing completion.

The Joplin Globe reports that the Missouri Alternative Renewable Energy Technology Center is expected to be the only one of its kind on a college campus in the country.

Final touches on the 27,000-square-foot MARET Center are under way. Once the center is up and running sometime during the upcoming spring semester, the only similar center in the U.S. will be the U.S. Department of Energy's Renewable Energy Lab in Golden, Colo., said Russell Hopper, executive director.

Hopper said that the center would be a technology demonstration laboratory and that many of the green technologies used in the building would remain exposed as an educational resource for students and professors.

The center will produce more energy than it uses, he said. The surplus energy will be sold to Empire District Electric Co., Crowder's electrical-service provider.

After being authorized for a $5.39 million grant by the Department of Energy in 2008, the construction, which was scheduled to begin in the spring of 2009, was delayed by an environmental assessment and concern by the U.S. Department of Fish and Wildlife that construction could harm the Ozark cavefish, an endangered species native to the caves and springs in the area. Crowder finally got the green light in October 2010 and broke ground on the building in March.

Hopper said that under ideal conditions, the building would generate about six kilowatts per hour from the 290 solar panels arrayed on its roof, and about 65 kilowatts per hour from a large wind turbine in front of the building.