SolarCity installs 1.4 MW of solar systems at Colorado schools

Oct 2, 2012 - US solar system provider SolarCity and Boulder Valley School District (BVSD) in the state of Colorado on Monday flipped the switch on 1.4 MW of solar installations at 14 schools across the district.

A total of 30 schools in BVSD now have solar arrays, more than 50% of all school buildings in the district, the solar company said yesterday.

The systems comprise over 5,000 solar panels and will offset more than 110 million pounds (49.9m kg) of carbon dioxide emissions per year. BVSD has signed a 20-year power purchase agreement (PPA) with SolarCity, under which the panels were installed at no upfront cost for the school district and it will buy solar power at a lower cost than it currently pays for utility electricity. SolarCity will maintain and monitor the systems.

Ghita Carroll, sustainability coordinator at BVSD said the project was mainly aimed at increasing the district's use of carbon-free solar energy and added that the solar installations would provide teaching tools for students. The latter will be able to track the amount of power being generated by their solar system and that being used by the school through SolarCity's web-based monitoring.

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