It seems appropriate, on a rare day when the sun is shining brightly outside my office window, to talk about our latest endeavor with the wonderful folks at ZEN. We are pretty excited about this one.
PRWA was recently awarded $330,000 to launch a Community Solar pilot program in conjunction with the Harrington School District and Zero Emissions Northwest. In 2024, ZEN began developing a concept for “Community Solar Projects” involving schools and gave us a call when they needed a nonprofit partner (when David calls and says, “I’ve got an idea,” we know it’s going to be brilliant). Harrington is our first project to test the concept and it’s been well received by the state and the school. We are awaiting final school board approval, with work commencing shortly thereafter. We expect this pilot project to be completed before the end of the year.
The beautiful thing about the pilot, and the larger program to follow, is that it’s a WIN WIN-WIN project. The school district wins annual energy savings (an estimated $150,000 of additional funding for the first 10 years and then $580,000 of estimated additional savings for years 11-30). Students win as these savings get reinvested in school programming. Harrington wins as we will also work to implement a battery storage solution to provide power during a community emergency.
To quote Hannibal, “I love it when a plan comes together!”
Take care,
Jody
