City College’s first solar panels are up and running after finishing the night parking lights and running the final tests on Friday.

The solar panel project, which began the day after graduation and lasted throughout the summer, was created by John Perlin, a Solar Energy Consultant from UCSB. He shared his vision with City College’s Environmental Studies Professor Dr. Adam Green, who got the project going.

“Our first priority is energy efficiency. By having on-site solar, we are actually generating electricity and creating renewable energy supplies,” said Green. “This solar system is tied into the city’s electric grid. We pull electricity out on a daily basis, but we also put electricity back in.

“The 29,848 square feet solar panels are now producing approximately 235-kilowatts of solar power, which is 10 percent of the power needed on West Campus.”

The cost of the project was $2,238,000. The college spends $1,000,000 per year on electricity. The solar panels will bring a 10 percent reduction of $100,000.00 per year. After around 11 years, there will essentially be free energy.

The solar panels provide many benefits to the college. They produce shaded parking, and will provide outlets for future, chargeable, electric vehicles. Due to the shade, there will be less heat radiated off the parking lot which will help cool the buildings surrounding the lots. The panels will also decrease dependency on fossil fuels.

“They look good,” said Freshman Dini O’Brien. “I thought they were just carports.”

Green asserted that the most valuable benefit is educational. “The solar project generates an outdoor living laboratory on campus, training students how we should be designing our systems. Students in a classroom can go outside and see what the professors are talking about – positive solutions,” he said.

People interested in the project can track the panel’s outputs online. “Project managers, professors and students can go online and observe the system as it generates power. It’s a great educational tool,” said Julie Hendricks, Director of Facilities.

Looking to the future, Joe Sullivan, vice president of business services said, “Because of the success of this project, we are looking towards doing some more projects in more areas of campus. We are looking at the parking lot 2-C next to the stadium, or parking lot 1-B along the top of the stadium near the portables.”

“It’s good to use green energy,” said student Daniel Gilliam.