SD 10 Solar Saves School District Money

                                     


  Last count over 60 schools have solar systems, millions of education dollars wasted.

               Was the cost of the above assessment and rehab included in the solar cost?  What will it cost when the roof starts leaking, or has this already happened? Nobody will be on that roof cleaning the snow, where would it go, why bother in winter power won't be worth pennies if anything.



 In 2014, an extensive Solar Engineering Study grant examined solar energy potential and savings on all district schools. 

 Curiously in March 2018 SD 58
Trustees made it clear they would not pursue solar any further it was not economically feasible.


SD10 info on the other hand says an  extensive study "grant" showed schools would save money.

The Study was done by Home Energy Solutions,  HES PV, the same company who sold the solar panels.  Haida Gwaii school district also received $100,000 for solar, I believe they might be the least sunny place on the planet..

Mary Polak (the Min. of Ed.)  states schools will save money that can be redirected. Ha!

Some info highlighted below excerpted from various public media locations.

A little difficult to understand for most, I have tried to condense it below.

Below info comes from the CNCP grant info

• NES and Lucerne were selected as the two initial projects based on recommendations, manageable costs and also payback as identified in our 2014 CNCP Solar Engineering Study
• NES – Total project cost: $25,453; grant request $12,726; district cost $12,727; cost savings annually – $2670
• Lucerne – Total project cost: $74,200; grant request $37.100; district cost $37,100; cost savings annually – $6940
• District costs have been budgeted to come from our AFG (Annual Facilities Grant) budget

Below from the superintendents report 

1. Solar Energy Interim Report  Rhys McLeod, Grade 11 student from NSS, has just completed some preliminary data analysis on the solar energy systems at NES and Lucerne  Rhys will present tonight on his preliminary findings and report in full next spring once a year’s worth of data has been tracked  Likewise, Scott Kipkie’s Grade 7/8/9 Math class has also done some preliminary data tracking, and found that on average since December, the system has produced 68.29 kWh per day – this number will increase as the days approach the solstice (sine curve)  On a number of days in the past few weeks, the Grade 7/8/9 class have observed that the Frontius daily monitoring system indicates production of electricity over 200 kWh which is equivalent to the energy needed to run 10-20 households

The specs below from an arrowlakes news item 

In total, 48 solar panels were installed at NES, and 132 at Lucerne. Each panel can generate around 265 watts. This will generate about 15,000 kilowatt hours of solar energy for NES and about 35,000 for Lucerne. This is the equivalent of about six homes.

The info below from an engineers audit on performance after about a year

 In 2016, the Lucerne system produced 32.05 MWh of electricity – 84% of the predicted 38.16 MWh. The Nakusp Elementary system produced 13.360 MWh of electricity in 2016, which is 97.1% of the amount predicted (13.766 MWh). The company calculated the average amount of electricity used at the schools over four years and used that number as a reference point. At LESS in 2016, electrical consumption was 74.7% of the fourSolar study results for Lucerne and Nakusp Elementary year average. At NES, it was 73.1% of the four-year average. The Lucerne system cost $66,016 to install, and savings were $3,205 in 2016. The NES system cost $41,076 to install, and savings were $1,336 in 2016. 

The estimate shows both system would be installed for $2.12/watt.

The audit engineer shows  NES cost installed for $3.47/watt

and Lucerne for $1.88/watt.  Extremely unlikely these could be installed for less than $3/watt even suggesting free student labor.  That suggest costs of $150,000, they claim both systems went in for $100,000.  Then there was the engineer cost to survey the roof structure to determine whether they could handle the weights.  The recent large Kelowna system that was denied by the BC Utilities Commission recently because it was of no benefit to anyone, increased GHG's and costs were borne by ratepayers estimated $4/watt installed.  The Nelson solar garden almost $6/watt installed.

The study estimated the power saving would be worth $9610, the audit says it was $4495 less than half the study??!

 Might this have anything to do with the extensive study done by the engineer whose company got the grant to do this extensive study and then  sold these systems?  Even 3 years later Merrit school district shelved any solar system thoughts because of cost.

Elsewhere you can read systems cost at   $149,480 thats a little over $3/watt, getting closer to realistic.

So where did these extra funds come from, what student activities suffered?

From $14M in a Carbon Neutral Capital Program  Arrow Lakes SD receives a grant for $99,653.

(Haida Gwaii SD is mentioned in this same Grant literature as receiving $100,000 for solar, I think they are tied as the least sunny place in the world, did the study show them making money too?)

 SD 10 matched this with $49,827, total $149,480 for the NES and Lucerne schools.

Over 60 schools now have millions in solar power systems.

Public money competing with BC Hydro selling clean green water for a profit.

Why would public money, in public buildings put power systems in that remove income

from publicly owned BC Hydro??  And increase the province's carbon footprint.

Nothing is cleaner or greener than our own waterpower, nothing.

The BCUC denial of the Kelowna project stated it had no benefit to anyone nor did it

decrease GHG's.

I find it very difficult to believe their costs there are too many different ones.

There will never be a payback, public money paid for these systems to make power otherwise could have been earned by clean green waterpower by  our public BC Hydro, now lost income. How can this make sense?  Ministry of Education public funds/grants pay for solar systems that avoid the income otherwise earned by our public BC Hydro and add to the provincial carbon footprint.  This is sort of paying the Visa with the Mastercard, or worse, losing income otherwise earned from clean green waterpower now  spilling down the river with the profits while the toothfairy pays for these fantasy power systems.


Who did this extensive study for the Ministry of Education saying solar systems would save money for schools?  It appears to be the Ed Knaggs, PEng, President of HES PV who also sold the systems.
Seems like a conflict of interest to me. 



My information is the company is HES PV  Home Energy Solutions, pictured above.

He sells electric vehicle charging stations out of his location in a mini industrial area of Victoria.

His EV charger was paid for by grant money from the Fraser Basin Council.   I made a FOI(Freedom of Information) request for that application.  Because they aren't directly government they didn't have to supply.  They did supply a blank application.  That  states criteria for an EV charging station  must be near shopping, dining, accommodation, highways etc.,   His location is out of the way in a mini industrial area of Victoria.

    His EV charging station installed from public grant money with the EV  business vehicle and advertising in front of the business.  Surrounded by warehouses, storage facilities, body shops, hardly available or desirable for the travelling EV public to stop by.

The association of professional engineers have a code of ethics.  What do you think?

This person with a Ministry of Education grant did an "extensive study" showing schools would save money with solar.  Yet a few years later Merritt SD shelves any idea of solar saying its uneconomic.
.

We have lots of public data from school solar systems I ahve shown some below.

Lets compare several BC school solar systems, I chose ones in place for several years making

for the longest average data cycle information which represents long term performance.

Although these were installed many years ago when prices were much higher I have reduced them

to all being installed for todays price of $4/watt, Power valued at BC Hydro solar rate 9.9c/kWh.

And money cost of 3.5% over 25 years.

These are the results below, all lose money.

All this data is publicly available on the internet and has been for years.

School solar system sizes vary I have reduced these numbers below to the loss/kWh/yr for each.

NOBODY IS MAKING A PROFIT OR SAVING MONEY AT ANY SCHOOL.

Location                                                      Loss per kw of installed solar 

Penticton High                                                          $151 x 102kW = ($15402/yr)

North Glenmore Elem Kelowna                                 138

Shannon Lake Elem Kelowna                                    157

Reynolds Secondary Victoria                                     159

Admiral Seymour Vancouver                                     134

Oak Bay High                                                             158

Dover Bay Nanaimo                                                   150

GISS Saltspring                                                          129
LVR high school Nelson                                            148

Nakusp/Lucerne combined                                         149  x 49kW = ($7301/yr)

And Mary Polak, Min. of Education news release stated "after an extensive study" it was shown

schools would save money with solar systems.  BS.

Fortunatly the house of cards is tumbling.  The BC Utilities commission this spring denied a solar project for Kelowna stating it was of no benefit to anyone and no benefit to reducing GHG.  The BCOAPO(pensioners) submission also stated it did not decrease GHG's and all costs were borne by ratepayers.

Fortis said it best "it will be a challenge when the public begin to discover the economics of solar"

BC Hydro applied to the BCUC this spring effective immediatly to no longer pay for anyone's exces solar power.  What was once a harmless feelgood political trickle is becoming an unaffordable flood.