Look to the sun to help energize school districts

For decades now, many have scornfully viewed solar power as the Rodney Dangerfield of alternative-energy sources. It’s gotten little respect from the masses, many of whom have berated it as inefficient, impractical and insanely expensive.

In recent years, however, the potential power of the sun has gained newfound esteem, acceptance and applications throughout the United States and the world. As its efficiency has soared and its costs have tumbled, solar now ranks as the fastest-growing clean- energy power generator for homes, businesses and schools in America, according to the Solar Energy Industries Association. The SEIA projects a staggering 119 percent increase in the domestic solar-energy market this year.

Given that the costs of solar installations have dropped a whopping 70 percent over the past 10 years, it becomes less surprising that skepticism has fallen over its potential to tap boundless energy from the colossal star in the center of our universe.

In the Mahoning Valley, a massive solar-energy conversion project in the Western Reserve Local School District in Berlin Center most visibly reflects that trend. Last week, the school system showed off to the public its installation of 396 solar panels on the roof of the district’s kindergarten-through-grade-12 building.

In partnership with Valley Energy Solar of Salem and supported with about $100,000 in grant funding from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the school system will lease the solar system from the company for 15 years. At the end of that period, the school district will get all of the power generated by the system at no charge.

According to Erin Quinlan of Valley Solar, the rooftop panels should produce about 137,000 kilowatt hours of solar energy annually, which is about enough to power 12 midsized homes.

LARGEST SOLAR SCHOOL PROJECT

School district leaders are to be commended for undertaking the largest solar application at a public school anywhere in Mahoning County. In addition to producing energy, the panels also will generate myriad spinoff economic, educational and environmental assets.

In the much-watched sphere of fiscal responsibility, the system is expected to result in savings of at least 20 percent per year or about $25,000 over a 10-year span. Those cost-saving projections also provide a long-term hedge against inevitable increases in rates from traditional fossil-fuel-based energy sources.

In the educational sphere, the new solar-powered school will give students myriad hands-on learning opportunities. It complements the important push for enhanced instruction in the STEM – Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics – fields at all grade levels. A software package will enable students to gauge the amount of energy produced based on the weather conditions of any given day. They’ll also realize firsthand – and debunk myths – that the panels are capable of producing energy even when skies are cloudy and overcast.

The school’s solar network can also serve as a practical job-building center as a laboratory to learn the ins and outs of solar technology and in assembly of the photovoltaic cells that power the panels.

The Western Reserve project and others like it across the country, however, shine brightest in their standing as clean-energy renewable alternatives to traditional fossil-fuel sources. These systems help reduce polluting greenhouse-gas emissions, cut our dependence on the finite supply of those resources and lessen the dangers of global warming.

As a result, other school districts in the Mahoning Valley would be wise to share in those benefits by exploring conversion of part of their energy needs to solar. Industry officials note that the large, flat rooftops typically found on Ohio public and private K-12 school buildings make many of them excellent candidates for rooftop solar photovoltaic or solar thermal systems. Throughout Ohio, the pace is growing as the Buckeye State ranks among the top 10 in the nation in solar-power applications at schools as measured by the number of kilowatts installed.

We look for that momentum to grow, sparked by the powerful cost savings and environmental enhancements that are generating long-delayed but much-deserved respect to the solar-power phenomenon.