BURRILLVILLE – An initiative to install solar panels on the roof of Burrillville Middle School could eliminate the electric bill for the building within four years, according to a proposal set to go before the Burrillville Town Council for a vote in December.
Schools Supt. Michael Sollitto said he and Director of Facilities Bill Robinson recently met with representatives from the Rhode Island Department of Education and RISE Energy to discuss a potential plan.
“RISE followed up with a proposal – a potential solar panel project at the middle school,” Sollitto told members of the School Committee at their recent meeting.
The project would cost $1.2 million in initial investment but would come with rebates from the school building authority, National Grid and RISE Energy, as well as several incentives, according to Sollitto.
“About $800,000 is reimbursable or incentivized for the project,” he said.
Sollitto said that after all rebates and incentives, net payments on the project would come out about $414,000 for the first four years, when the town would hit the break even point, beginning to see a profit in the fifth.
“Those solar panels would fully power the middle school,” he said, noting that the current cost to power the Broncos Highway structure, a sprawling 126,000-square-foot school built in 1989 serving grades 6 through 8, comes to around $90,000 a year. “It would eliminate our electric bill at the middle school.”
Over 25 years – the projected life of the panels – Sollitto said the town would see $2.7 million in energy savings. The focus, he said, is on the middle school due to both its flat roof and the fact that the property is served by Rhode Island Energy. In the future, he noted that the district could look into installing solar on other town schools served by Pascoag Utility District.
“They’ve been great to work with – both Rhode Island Energy and Pascoag Utility,” Sollitto said. “I really want to get this one rolling first.”
“Of course the decision to move forward or not move forward would be up to the Town Council, because they would commit to fund the initial investment,” Sollitto said, noting he hopes to go before the board to present the plan with representatives from RIDE and RISE sometime in December.
“We’re really trying to think of some imaginative ways and think outside the box to have a cost savings, because we know there are so many challenges in public education budgets,” he said.
Editor’s note: An earlier version of this story stated that net payments on the project would come out about $14,000 rather than $414,000. We apologize for the error.
Where are the solar panels going? On the rooftops, on the ground in the existing field, do they have to clear 3 aces to install them? More information is needed!
Read the article, they’re proposing a rooftop solar project.
The very first sentence says “An initiative to install solar panels on the roof of Burrillville Middle School….”
Solar technolgy has been around for many years. Reality is, the benefits and return on investment are consistantly over sold. For example, the 1st sentence above states it COULD elimate the electric bill of the building within 4 years…. Why not in the first month? Will anybody verify that similar solar panel configurations currently installed are delivering the expectaions originally stated before installation? Is the Route 7 Solar farm recently installed within the past year meeting the expectations stated before installation? If not why not?
25 years is a long time and most of us won’t be around to be held accountable if the expectations are delivered…. who even knows if the panels will be funtioning in 25 years!
Your answer is in the article. After 4 years, the savings from the electric bill will have covered the cost of the installation, known as a break-even point. Once they’re paid off, the electric bill will be functionally eliminated.
They’re a no-brainer.