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Portland’s biggest university and electrical company are teaming together to give power engineering education a boost.

Portland General Electric recently awarded a $50,000 grant to Portland State University to help fund the creation of a power engineering teaching laboratory, which will prepare engineering students for careers in the power industry.

The laboratory will be for the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering in the Maseeh College of Engineering and Computer Science. Within the lab, industry-relevant, hands-on projects will be taught as part of students’ curricula and will lead to bachelor’s and master’s electrical engineering degrees with specializations in power engineering, according to university officials.

The grant is part of a memorandum of understanding established by PSU and PGE in 2010; the two entities set a goal to help Portland become a leader in developing and implementing urban sustainability. Since the memorandum’s creation, PGE has donated more than $850,000 to the school.