Going, saving green

Due to the districtwide construction and installation of solar panels at Contra Costa, Diablo Valley and Los Medanos colleges, a total of $338,759 has been saved during the months of February through June after the systems were placed online, district officials said. "They are a great success," Chief Facilities Planner for the district Ray Pyle said. "Not only are they beneficial to the environment, but they provide operating savings for the district."

Broken down into savings at each college, in those five months, DVC has saved approximately $200,302, LMC $91,392 and CCC has saved $47,065, according to District Communications and Community Relations Director Timothy Leong.

After about four to six months of construction in partnership with Chevron Energy Solutions, the panels were completed at the end of January.

Leong said the first discussions publicly about the project date back to 2005. With the passage of the 2006 Measure A bond, the district was able to come up with the money to support the project, which cost more than $32 million.

"($32 million) is not an easy number to swallow," Leong said. "And it isn't the kind of money you just find. So we are very thankful, because if it wasn't for the community who supported the bond measure, we wouldn't have had the money to do it at all."

The district also received $8.4 million in rebates from Pacific Gas & Electric, therefore resulting in a net cost of $23.8 million, Leong said.

Variables pertaining to the savings discrepancies between the campuses include the number of panels each school contains, as well as assumptions that were made on the number of buildings at each campus.

"During the same time we were installing the solar panels, we were also installing new buildings at CCC and LMC," Pyle said. "So our actual power consumption went up during that time frame."

Leong projected that an annual cost savings estimate will be $813,021 at the district level, with CCC saving an annual estimate of $112,957.

At CCC, the solar panels are located in Lot 10 behind the Receiving Building. Buildings and Grounds Manager Bruce King said there has been talk of adding more panels in other parking lots, but ultimately, it comes down to what demands the most attention.

CCC had purchased additional panels that were originally to be placed on the campus, but Leong said because of space constraints some of the panels had to be moved and placed at DVC and LMC.

He said these Phase 2 panels should be up and running by the end of this month.

Several locations other than the parking lots were suggested, including the roofs of buildings, both Leong and King said.

"I'm sure what they did made the most sense. Obviously, the rooftops are out of the way, but at the same time there may be additional costs and you must have people maintaining them," Leong said. "The parking lots were better economically and just more practical. Plus, they provide great shade in the summer."

The solar panels work by mounting silicon beneath non-reflective glass to produce photovoltaic panels. These panels collect photons from the sun, converting them into direct current power. The created power then flows into an inverter and this inverter transforms the power into basic voltage and alternating current electrical power.

According to Leong, the district is estimated to save an annual estimate of 2.7 million kilowatt hours, with CCC contributing 707,438 kilowatt hours to the total.

Solar panels have a capacity of 534 kilowatts. When Phase 2 goes online, it will produce an additional 534 kilowatts, resulting in a total of 3.2 megawatts of power, Leong said.

Along with the solar panels, a lot of technological improvements have been made.

Leong said that there have been energy efficiency retrofits, mainly a switch from using incandescent light bulbs to compact fluorescent fixtures.

"The fluorescent fixtures use one-third of the electricity it would take to provide the same amount of energy as an incandescent light bulb," he said.

He said that combinations of the new light bulbs as well as the new technology in the electronics that drive the lights are improvements that have been made in terms of lighting retrofits. Leong said 22,000 lights have been replaced between the three schools.

"Add to the fact you are saving money with these new lights and the solar panels which are doing the opposite by generating electricity, and we are both saving and generating electricity," Leong said.

Pyle said the solar panel effort has drawn interest across the state.

"There is a lot of interest (in the panels) in the state community colleges," he said. "Whenever I am out at conferences or even here in the office, I get a lot of people from other districts looking at the panels asking questions, asking for guidelines."

King said he believed the district was setting a good example for the community.

"I think they are wonderful," King said. "They provide free energy, are good for the environment and make money. The money we are saving is money we can use on other things for the campus too."

Contact Regina Sarnicola at rsarnicola.advocate@gmail.com.