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By News Desk | on August 04, 2022
A solar panel at Valley Center Middle School. The panels at this school will produce an estimated 211 kilowatt hours of electricity.
This year, motorists at four Valley Center Pauma Unified School District campuses will be able to park in the shade. But that’s not the primary reason for the solar arrays. The main reason is that they will save the school district about $850,000 a year by eliminating 81% of its electric bill. That will add up to about $8.2 million over the 20 year life of the system, according to Jon Petersen, the school district’s chief business officer. The solar arrays are being installed at Valley Center High School, at the student parking lot by the gym; Valley Center Middle School, Valley Center Primary School and Valley Center Elementary School, which will also serve the district office complex. “The primary purpose is to generate power, although it’s kind of nice that you get some shade for your automobile,” said Petersen. The high school array will generate 496 kilowatt hours (KW), the middle school 211 KW, the primary school 73 KW and the elementary school 233 KW. “That adds up to 1,013 KW, which is a one megawatt system,” said Petersen. “That should offset eighty-one percent of our energy needs.”
Most of the installation time for the school solar panels will be done when school begins—although they won’t go “live” until November.
The district began exploring installing such a system when Petersen became chief business officer. The first move to make the district more efficient was to replace inefficient lighting and 70% of the HVAC (heating, ventilation, and air conditioning) systems. “So now that we were more energy-efficient it seemed time to take the next step,” said Petersen. Years ago the district looked at borrowing money to install a solar system, but this time they took a different approach. The district made a purchase agreement with ForeFront Power, a solar energy company based in San Francisco. The district didn’t put up any upfront money. “They essentially own the system on our lots and we will purchase the power from them at a rate less than SDG&E and the rate is fixed for 20 years,” said Petersen. “We will be just under 16 cents per KWH for 20 years.” That’s an $850,000 savings each year at the four sites, once they are all operational, although the first year the savings will be $170,000. “The rate we pay stays the same for twenty years,” said Petersen. “We have projections that if SDG&E were to increase 6.7% a year, we would save $8.2 million over the life of the system. So potentially we could save more. I’m just happy to have one fixed electrical rate for 20 years.” Similar solar arrays don’t pencil out yet for the Lilac and Pauma schools, said Petersen. “To do the solar canopies over parking lots is costly. Lilac is small and has very little space. There are a lot of Department of the State Architect issues with putting solar on roofs, which is why you don’t see that much on schools. Once we get this work done we could take a second look.” A “substantial amount” should be done by the end of September,” said Petersen. “I hope to have the arrays in commercial operation about Thanksgiving. By September we will be able to start using the parking lots again.”
A significant portion of the parking lot at the middle school was blocked off for most of the summer to install the solar array.
The solar arrays will also serve an educational purpose. “We will be happy to show the students about solar production,” said Petersen. “They will be able to see how electricity is being generated by following it on a website. It’s an opportunity to teach students about renewable energy.”
What was the cost of the system?
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