esrosedotblog

RIGHTEOUS INDIGNATION

Imagine!

I was driving past the high school and there is construction going on in the parking lots.

The are cutting down all the shade trees! WTF?

Then they are putting in pillars and it not hard to see that they are building, what? A multitiered parking lot?

John says "no". Not multistory. They are using the build up approach, building the "roof" near the ground to be hoisted up when they are ready. One story?

How could this be? How much money is this costing?

Then, a second parking lot. Same thing. My God!

Then a third. Holy shit.

This is outrageous. Just to keep the faculty and kids cooler in the summer?

Then John found out what was going on.

They are installing solar panels! Not only at this school, but all the schools. On the massive parking lots owned by the city in this car culture.

We don't have many, any buses. Everyone has to get there on their own. Their own cars, parents or public transit which is pretty good as it turns out.

The initiative to put solar all over the largest school district is a huge undertaking. And the project is described here.

Palm Springs Unified is Going Solar

It is PS Unified but there are schools in other cities in this district. Ten schools.

The first lot is now up. The "roofs" are huge. They are tilted slightly away from the east and toward the mountains. The preponderance of sun. I am not sure yet, but I do not think that they tilt.

Too bad about the trees. They were prettier. I have to admit the panels are not too aesthetically satisfying. But neither was the parking lot, really.

60-90 % of the schools power will come through the panels. This is a lot of power. And then there is the power that will be saved with cooler cars that crank up their AC as soon as the parkers open them up.

The heat here, on the asphalt, is quite breathtaking. Sometimes literally and too much. Vulnerable people can die.

The larger story here is that eventually all public parking and open space will have these panels over it.

Some commercial operations are thinking about it.

We have passed the tipping point. At present, commercial land will not quite pay back for solar but soon, no doubt, there will be a mad scramble to get it in.

Labels: solar energy