This post was contributed by a community member. The views expressed here are the author's own.

Schools

School Board Shines Bright on Solar Panel Project

Culver City School Board agrees to take the first steps in a plan that will place solar panels on three schools and add money to the CCUSD's general fund.

It turns out that going green can actually result in more green—dollars that is. 

The Culver City Unified School District's school board recently voted to take advantage of a special state incentive program that will allow the district to install solar panels on three schools in the district and add money to the general fund at the same time.

"It was great," said Todd Johnson, the chair of the board's Environmental Sustainability Committee, about the move by the board. "There was a huge outpouring from the community."

Find out what's happening in Culver Citywith free, real-time updates from Patch.

As part of the advisory committee, Johnson and committee members have been studying for several years the impact of installing the panels, which generate electricity that can either be used by the schools or sold back to the utility companies. Johnson explained that the district has money generated by various bonds that can only be used for capital improvements on school properties and can't be used for teacher salaries or other general fund uses.

A state program, the California Solar Incentives, provides rebates to schools that install solar panels, money that Johnson said can be returned directly to the district's general fund. He roughly estimates Culver City's rebate to be around $1.2 million dollars. That money would be a significant help to the district's anticipated $11 million budget shortfall.

Find out what's happening in Culver Citywith free, real-time updates from Patch.

"So in a lot of ways, this is a way to deal with the budget and it just happens to have incredible environmental benefits," Johnson said.

The board's vote will enable district staff, with Johnson's committee, to prepare a Request For Proposals to find a contractor, as well as submit a plan and deposit to the state to lock in the rebate amount that will come back to the district once the panels are installed.

"We're going to start working on the RFP and look into how to lock in the CSI rebate. That's the big thing," Johnson said. He added that there's a fairly small window of time since the rebate amounts will drop over a period of months.

He said that the district also has to find out exactly how much the deposit to the state will be.

"The state was pretty clever about hooking them in," Johnson said, about how the deposit requirement forces districts to be at least seriously considering the panels. The deposit is also refundable once the panels are up.

"It's very exciting," said school board member . "We have many millions in a facilities account that we can't use for hiring teachers. But if we were to install the solar panels with some of this money, we would be able to lower our energy costs and use the savings. It's a great way to do something for the environment, but also to not make as many cuts."

According to Tom Kelly, who helps school districts get solar panels through his work with Kyoto USA, a non-profit organization working to help institutions develop more environmentally sustainable practices, several school districts in California are installing solar panels, including the San Ramon school district.

"The solar project was a revenue generator," Kelly explained. "They're actually putting money into the district and at a time when districts need to put money into their general funds, it's so attractive."

Silbiger said that phase one of the solar project will install solar panels on Culver Park High School, and .  The panels will not interfere with and to install artificial turf on the high school football field. Correction 2/15/11: , not Culver Park High School will receive solar panels. 

"According to our staff, we can pay for this [solar panel] project and the other ones we were planning," Silbiger said. "It looks like we'll have the solar panels at the three phase one sites."

We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here

The views expressed in this post are the author's own. Want to post on Patch?