LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — The Board of Supervisors kicked off the year by approving a contract for a new solar installation to serve the Lake County Courthouse campus.
Public Services Director Lars Ewing presented a resolution and a contract with Staten Solar Corp., totaling $2,284,131, for design, installation and commissioning of the new solar installation to the board at its Jan. 9 meeting.
The planned solar array will serve the courthouse, District Attorney’s Office and the courthouse museum, which Ewing said are all served through the same meter.
Ewing’s report explained that, over the last few years, his staff — working along with the county’s Space Use Committee and Capital Improvement Committee — has worked on a photovoltaic and electric vehicle charging station project at the courthouse campus “to implement a high-visibility clean energy project.”
He added, “The purpose of this item is to consider a resolution making findings that the project will result in energy cost savings greater than the cost of the project, as well as a contract with Staten Solar Corporation to design, build, and commission the project.
Ewing said that in September 2022 the board heard a presentation summarizing the findings of a preliminary energy audit report for county facilities.
The report identified the courthouse, as well as the District Attorney’s Office parking lot that sits behind it, as good sites for solar photovoltaic panels and electric vehicle charging stations.
Ewing said the board approved funding for the project in its fiscal year 2022-23 budget, and in October of 2022 hired Optony Inc. “to provide procurement and selection assistance as well as third-party financial and design analysis for the project.”
Optony was tasked with soliciting requests for proposals to design and construct the project. Six companies submitted proposals and San Jose-based Staten Solar Corp. was selected.
The project the board approved is a 444 kilowatt solar photovoltaic carport array at the main parking lot situated west of the District Attorney’s Office building.
Ewing said both the courthouse and District Attorney’s Office buildings are currently powered by Pacific Gas and Electric, with typical annual energy consumption and PG&E charges of approximately 870,000 kilowatt-hour and $210,000 at the courthouse, and 290,000 kilowatt-hour and $70,000 at the district attorney’s building.
The proposed solar array will produce an estimated 670,000 kilowatt-hours for the two buildings.
Ewing told the board during the Jan. 9 meeting that funding for the project was allocated in this year’s budget.
It was decided that the best project was a carport parking lot array just west of the District Attorney’s Office. “Typically you might consider a roof project,” Ewing said, but both the courthouse and DA’s Office are heavily in use and generating revenue for the county through facility space leases with AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon for telecommunications equipment.
Having a rooftop array would make future roof repairs and general roof access very challenging, while Ewing explained in his written report that a carport array will provide an additional benefit to employees and visitors alike.
The financial analysis completed by Optony assumes a 3% assumed annual PG&E rate escalation, a 0.5% annual panel degradation rate, the county paying for operations and maintenance costs after the 10th year and the county’s receipt of a 30% investment tax credit, Ewing’s written report explained.
That analysis anticipates that the array the county is planning will offset 58% of facility use at both buildings and provide a payback period of approximately 10 years, resulting in total savings of approximately $3.27 million over the 25-year system life. “The modules are power warranted for 30 years, so the cost savings may very well exceed these figures,” Ewing’s report explained.
“Ultimately this project is intended to save us money in the long term,” Ewing told the board.
In addition, the project includes three dual-port electronic vehicle charging stations. “These stations were included in the project with the vision that the County would soon add electric vehicles to its fleet. Whether or not that occurs, the charging stations will be available on a pay-for-use basis for non-County EV’s (this potential revenue was not included in Optony’s financial analysis),” Ewing’s report explained.
The county worked with the city of Lakeport’s Community Development Department staff to evaluate the project under the California Environmental Quality Act, or CEQA. Ewing reported that the city of Lakeport has confirmed it is ministerially exempt from CEQA.
Board Chair Bruno Sabatier said he thought he would see more than three connections for electric vehicles and he wanted to be prepared for future growth. He asked if it’s easy to add more connections. Jonathan Whelan of Optony, who attended the meeting virtually, said the answer was yes, with some additional costs.
“I’m thinking 25 years from now, our parking lot will look drastically different in the vehicles that we have,” said Sabatier, adding that he would love to see them being able to prepare for expansion of charging stations.
Supervisor Moke Simon agreed, suggesting they could at least put conduit in the ground so the system is expandable.
Ewing noted during the discussion that the EV charging stations will eliminate some regular parking stalls in the DA’s Office parking lot. “I think the reward is better than the risk.”
Simon also asked about battery backup in the future. Whelan said the project originally was designed with battery storage as an alternative. While it added additional savings, it was not enough to cover the additional cost.
However, Whelan said that will change in the coming years, and the system can be retrofitted with a battery energy storage system.
Possible locations for battery storage included an equipment pad on the north side of the DA’s Office as well as inside the DA’s Office sally port.
The supervisors unanimously approved both the resolution to authorize the contract and the agreement.
Ewing’s report said that it’s expected that the project will be commissioned by the fall. Once the contract is in effect, there will be a detailed construction schedule and schematic design.
Lake County has been doing major solar projects since 2007, when it began work on a 3 megawatts array that was credited as being the largest solar-energy system on county property in California at the time.
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Supervisors approve new solar installation to power courthouse campus
- Elizabeth Larson
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