Thanks to 97 renewable energy projects announced by Massachusetts’ Governor Deval Patrick on Feb. 17, Drury High School in North Adams will be getting a 38-kilowatt solar photovoltaic array that school officials expect will save $5,000 in electricity costs and prevent more than 39,631 pounds of carbon emissions from being generated by regional electric utility National Grid.
National Grid, one of the largest U.S. utilities, operating through about 11 subsidiaries, has an electricity generating profile that has been artificially “greened” by replacing coal (42 percent in 1990) with natural gas, in combined cycle power plants. Unfortunately, natural gas isn’t really a green fuel, just somewhat less brown than coal, and both are fossil fuels.
North Adams, a small community in the northwest corner of the state, had hoped to install a solar project that would offset all the electricity needs of the high school, but the cost – about $1.5 million – was daunting, noted Jay Green, the city's administrative officer, who helped write the solar grant.
Installation at Drury High School is expected to take place this summer, after National Grid is informed, a public bidding process used to hire an installer, and the roof inspected to be certain it can bear the weight of the more than 230 solar panels needed to generate an estimated 170 kilowatt-hours of electricity per day, or about enough to power 5 average American homes.
Eventually, Green added, the city (which operates the school) hopes to expand the solar array, preferably when more grant funding becomes available. The city has no doubt, however, that solar energy is a beneficial technology; the LEED-certified North Adams Public Library already has a 10-kilowatt solar array.
The North Adams award, funded through ARRA via the U.S. Department of Energy’s EECBG (Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grants) program, was one of the largest awarded in the state. This is due, in part, to the fact that the grant – legally capped at $150,000 – was effectively doubled by the participation of nearby community Clarksburg, whose young people also attend Drury High School.
The installation will feature two monitors, or displays, one strictly for maintenance purposes, the other a classroom display similar to Williamstown Elementary School, where a custom-designed format streams real-time building energy use data in both graphic and numeric formats to a monitor located in the lobby.
Other Berkshire County solar photovoltaic grants include: $55,125 in North Adams for 7 kilowatts at the wastewater treatment plant; pole-mounted solar installations in Egremont ranging from 3.2 kilowatts to 16 kilowatts; and $66,479 for a 5-kilowatt installation at the public works building in Stockbridge.