The District 205 school board was given a breakdown of its electricity expenses since the approval of the solar energy agreement and the renovation work at buildings around the district.
Assistant Superintendent for Finance and Operation Jennifer Hamm told the board the district is seeing a savings of $79,772.83. These savings have been seen even after several buildings saw significant expansions from the district-wide building renovation project and the addition of air conditioning at King Elementary.
Superintendent Dr. John Asplund told the board that the district is looking at other avenues to expand on solar energy.
“We’re in the preliminary stages but I’m talking to two different companies,” Asplund said Monday night. “I want to see the feasibility of buying it rather than doing the PPA, the power purchase agreement. There are a lot of factors that go into that and we’ll have to see how long our appetite is for payback on that. Obviously over time, if you own the solar panels, you will save money. It’s just how long do want that to take? And, as they get cheaper, it’s going to be easier to do that and have that return. The return on investment will be a lot shorter.”
Asplund said in 2014 when he was with a different district, he said the return was 24 years. But now, costs have gone down and the ROI is shorter.
Asplund said he’s working to get a quote for rooftop units at Silas Willard to determine if the initial investment in owning the panels is worth it or if it would be more cost effective for the district to enter into another PPA.
He said he believed there could be more solar on the district’s campuses if they could get competitive bids.
