SolarCity Pledges Solar For Schools

The idea that existing schools can save money by installing solar systems isn’t anything new. But solar technologies could potentially be even more influential in getting new classrooms into place more quickly in communities where electricity isn’t readily available.

One well-known company taking this view (albeit a self-interested one) is SolarCity  

 SCTY +3.33%, which this week created an organization called the Give Power 

Foundation that will donate an elementary school solar installation — along with an energy storage component to handle night-time use by the communities they serve — for every 1 megawatt of residential solar that it installs during 2014.

(Note to those asking in their heads: No, the backup batteries aren’t related to SolarCity’s Tesla deal.)

The SolarCity foundation will team up with a youth service NGO called buildOn to construct the installations, targeted at the roughly 291 million children who attend primary schools that aren’t supported by electricity. The focus is remote areas, and the initial locations will include Haiti, Mali, Malawi and Nepal.

Notes the company, which celebrates its first IPO anniversary this month: “By giving the gift of power, we will enable schools in remote locations throughout the world to foster continuing education during evenings and become the central places for these communities to grow closer and celebrate together.”

Some might consider this a stunt to deflect attention from questions over SolarCity’s past business practices and the way that it values its installations in order to collect certain tax rebates. Still, considering that SolarCity “signs a new customer every five minutes,” its solar school donations could add up rather fast. The U.S. residential market just recorded its biggest quarterly gain ever: adding 186 megawatts, or a 49% increase over the year-earlier period, reports GTM Research and the Solar Energy Industries Association.

Solar for every (temporary) classroom?

While the focus of SolarCity’s philanthropic effort is emerging economies, architecture firm Perkins+Will has created a modular solar-powered classroom, called Sprout Space, meant to serve mobile K-12 learning environments.

The module is designed to be net-zero: to produce as much energy as it needs to operate. The technologies that help it pull this off include sun shades, integrated rainwater collectors, highly efficient heating, ventilation and cooling (HVAC) systems and solar photovoltaic panels.

The unit at the Sprout Space demonstration installation in the National Building Museum in Washington, D.C., uses HVAC and solar technology from LG Electronics : the Multi-V Mini (for the HVAC) and the X Module for solar generation needed to run the building. Approximately 16 of the solar modules produce the same electricity as a 4-kilowatt power plant. The demo uses factory-installed racking and grounded inverters. The entire system was integrated by Modular Air and marketed as “Greenergy 1000.”

“This is a demonstration that has viability and that we know can be replicated,” said Kevin McNamara, vice president of commercial air conditioning for LG Electronics. 

“We see this as a great way to leverage the inverter technology.”

Aside from Sprout Space, McNamara sees this integrated system as appropriate for residential applications: there are projects under way in Florida and Georgia.

The modular classroom market is bigger than you probably realize: there are more than 300,000 “temporary” classrooms (you know, those make-shift buildings you see on school properties) in the United States. Many of them are due for renovations, and this self-contained unit is being pitched as one option. “When the right financial analysis is done, the hurdles become lower,” McNamara said. “Longer term, it is about energy and also about the maintenance of the facility and how it is constructed, along with the labor costs and material costs. The beauty of these systems is in their simplicity. … It’s about what is being spent, versus what you can avoid spending.”

All things considered, the number of schools using solar power today is rather miniscule: The installed capacity is roughly 116 megawatts (about 637 schools), or about 0.64% of all the schools in the United States, according to data gathered by The Solar Foundation.