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Solar-powered colleges: State of California, SunEdison join forces to put PV on university campuses
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As his surprise appearance on the opening night of Solar Power International showed again, the sight of Arnold Schwarzenegger on a big screen can still get the juices flowing and the sound of his inimitable accent rarely fails to bring a smile to the faces of crowd members. After repeating one of his favorite solar cliches--"green for the environment, green for the economy"--his Ahnuldness spoke of a time when he envisions flying "in a helicopter up and down California and seeing no warehouses without solar on top." He's not the only one who muses about all that underutilized rooftop real-estate acreage being covered with millions of PV panels some day. Given Tuesday's announcement about a private-public deal to put 8 MW of solar power on California State University campus rooftops, parking canopies, and ground mounts, it's too bad the governor didn't include school buildings in his aerial vision.
After repeating one of his favorite solar cliches--"green for the environment, green for the economy"--his Ahnuldness spoke of a time when he envisions flying "in a helicopter up and down California (imagine pronunciation here) and seeing no warehouses without solar on top." He's not the only one who muses about all that underutilized rooftop real-estate acreage being covered with millions of PV panels some day.
Given Tuesday's announcement about a private-public deal to put 8 MW of solar power on California State University campus rooftops, parking canopies, and ground mounts, it's too bad the governor didn't include school buildings in his aerial vision.
SunEdison and the state of California have signed a power purchase agreement to install PV systems on 15 of the state university campuses--from Humboldt in the north to San Marcos in the south-- as well as the chancellor's office digs. In typical PPA fashion, SunEd will finance, build, and operate the systems for 20 years, allowing CSU to avoid paying the upfront construction costs while benefiting from renewable energy at retail or even less-than-retail rates.
Eight megawatts should deliver about 12 million kilowatt-hours of juice during the first year of operation, the partners said, which equals about 5% of the entire university system's annual energy load. Of course, the press release included the obligatory carbon-footprint reduction/automobile-removal equivalent numbers--9485 metric tons of CO2 and 48,937 (not 48,938, mind you) cars, respectively.
The PR also included the mistaken assertion that the PV used would be "new SunEdison solar panels," since the integrator company does not manufacture its own modules at last report. Given the diversity of installation sites and geographic diversity of the campuses, I'd wager that more than one module company's boxes (or flex) ends up in the mix once all the megawatts are mounted.
The state Department of General Services negotiated the deal with SunEd, part of a larger PV PPA that should eventually lead to 20 MW of solar installed at various government sites. Some 4.2 MW of solar has already been deployed at eight state facilities, and another 7 MW is planned for eight more Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation and Department of Mental Health locales (that's right, PV-powered prisons and mental hospitals).
It's heart-warming to see that some of that Cali sol will soon be powering institutions of higher learning, not just keeping the lights on at institutions of another variety altogether.
