Sedona-Oak Creek Unified School District #9 (Sedona), a district of 1,500 students located in Northern Arizona, consists of two K-8 and one 9-12 school. While the district may be small in terms of student population and number of facilities, administrators are proving large in terms of planning for the future. Specifically, the district is in the process of installing solar energy projects to reduce energy costs.
As is common in other states, Arizona school districts received a certain amount of money from the state every year that was earmarked to pay for utilities in excess of a baseline. In Arizona, that amount was based on a figure that was developed several years ago and was intended to help school districts offset fluctuations in utility rates. Since 2009, that help from the state has disappeared, and school districts now must pay for all utility costs from the same budget that funds the classroom teachers and supplies.
The first project, completed in spring of 2009, was a 100-kW, roof-mounted, thin film system located at Big Park Community School, offsetting approximately 35 percent of the school’s electricity cost.
The largest project includes an 806-kW, ground-mounted, solar photovoltaic array at Sedona Red Rock High School, which was completed last fall. The system is not only an energy saver, but also a teaching tool for the science program at the high school.
The next project to come online will be a roof-mounted, crystalline panel system at the new district office, including a geothermal HVAC system and 48 kW of solar photovoltaics, which will offset a portion of the office’s electricity.
The fourth project, at West Sedona School, is a rebuilt pool that will have a solar thermal system to heat the water in the pool, as opposed to using a gas boiler, the panels of which will double as shade structures for the swimmers. “So, there’s a dual benefit to putting in the solar thermal system at the pool,” says Dave Young, LEED-AP, Sedona’s project manager via Arcadis, an international firm that manages the bond. The school will also boast a 58-kW, ground-mounted, solar photovoltaic system to help offset electricity costs.
Because it’s a school district, Sedona didn’t receive any federal incentives or tax breaks to reduce the cost of the projects. However, a $1.8-million rebate for the high school from local power provider APS reduced the cost of that project from $4.8 million to $3 million, Young notes. From this investment, the district will save 1.2 million kW hours per year at the high school, between 50 percent and 60 percent of its electricity consumption. Specifically, administrators anticipate saving more than $100,000 in the first year from the high school’s system.
“The obvious benefit of solar,” says Young, “is it reduces the amount of power the high school consumes. It also means that there is additional savings in the maintenance and operations budget, which provides teachers’ salaries and school supplies.” Plus, as utilities increase, the cost of the system won’t go up — it’s paid for and will keep on generating electricity.
The average payback for one photovoltaic system is about 12 years. And, because the four projects are different, each has its own payback period.
Panel installation is easy — they simply plug together. If one panel stops working, the string (usually 12 to 15 individual panels) that it is attached to stops working, but all the other strings in the array continue to operate. To put that in perspective, the Sedona High School project includes 3,838 panels. If one panel stops working, an entire string of 14 stops working, but the remaining 3,824 panels remain in operation.
Sedona administrators have recognized several other bonuses of using solar energy. One is what Thomas calls the “touchy feely” aspect — it’s good public relations to say that you’re using less electricity produced from coal-burning plants.
In planning for their future, Sedona administrators are getting more bang for their buck than they probably anticipated. Of course they knew they would realize huge savings from generating electricity via solar power, but did they anticipate the benefits of good public relations, keeping the investment local and a stronger science program? Regardless, they’re clearly taking advantage of all that solar power offers.