Northwestern is preparing to move further into the future of renewable energy with the installation of its first grid-tied solar electricity system.
A student-led initiative co-organized by Engineers for a Sustainable World, Green It Now and the Northwestern Sustainability Fund has secured the funding needed to install a 16.8 kw photovoltaic system on the roof of the Ford Motor Company Engineering Design Center, said Ren Chung Yu, a McCormick senior and member of GRIN and ESW.
NSF founder Anthony Valente said the panels will divert “27,720 pounds of equivalent carbon dioxide” annually, which is the equivalent of saving four acres of trees each year.The panels will represent an important step toward more sustainable energy sources at NU, said Dave Grosskopf, a project manager for NU Facilities Management who worked with the student organizers to guide the logistical aspects of the project.
“This is groundbreaking,” Grosskopf said. “It is a great first step toward progressive energy resources.”
The system will likely be installed and functioning by spring of 2011, GRIN and ESW member Phil Dziedzic said.
“The construction doesn’t take that long,” the McCormick senior said. “It is mostly about securing the panels and wiring them into the grid. There isn’t a lot of physical labor that needs to happen. Our goal would be to have it up there and running by the end of the next academic year.”
The beginning of construction is contingent upon the groups raising about another $10,000. Valente said the existing funds cover the actual cost of the project, but Facilities Management requires a 10 percent “contingency fee” to complete the project, “in case the project doesn’t go according to plan.” However, based on their success fundraising, the project organizers said they don’t anticipate any difficulty in securing these additional funds.
The organizers have raised a total of $106,133 so far toward the cost of the panels and installation. Most recently, they received a $65,000 grant from the Illinois Clean Energy Community Foundation, which Yu said will cover about 60 percent of the project cost. Before applying for the grant a few months ago, organizers secured the other 40 percent of the funds, most of which came from grants and awards within the University.
“In order to make our application as strong as possible, we had to show that we could pay 40 percent provided that (ICECF provides) the 60 percent. … Without the support of other funders and supporters within the University, this wouldn’t have happened,” Yu said.Other than the ICECF grant, the largest source of funding for the project came from NSF, ESW and the Initiative for Sustainability and Energy at Northwestern. The Murphy Society Award and Facilities Management were also among the funders. The project also received support in various capacities from the McCormick School of Engineering and the Environmental Policy and Culture program, Yu said.
Richard Lueptow, senior associate dean for McCormick whose office helped fund the project, assisted the students with their proposal. He said the Ford Center is an appropriate location for the panels because of the work that occurs there.
“It is great that we are looking at alternative energy with the Ford building in that the things we do in that building are looking forward,” he said. “It is a place where we explore new ideas and new projects.”
Lueptow said he is “delighted” the students have been successful in funding their proposal.
Many of NU’s peer institutions already have solar photovoltaic systems on their campuses, including half of the College Board’s 14 most common cross applicants with NU, according to the project proposal. Once NU’s planned system is installed, the University will have the biggest individual on-site photovoltaic system of those 14 universities, Yu said.
The project is about more than the physical addition of a solar energy system on campus, Yu said.
“The goal was never to just build a solar panel system,” he said. “The goal was to generate clean energy at Northwestern, demonstrate NU’s commitment to sustainability, facilitate teaching about renewable energy, facilitate outreach and be an inspirational tool for the Evanston and NU community.”
To publicize the various benefits of the system, Dziedzic said the panels will have an online monitoring system.
“There will be some form of energy tracking and time tracking too, so that you can see patterns and how it has done in history or on a given day, ” he said. “It will be a useful publicity tool and useful for classroom integration.”
Yu said he hopes the project inspires future steps toward sustainable energy on campus.
“Putting it up there is just the first step,” Yu said. “We hope that this will be the first of many renewable energy systems at NU.”
