OPALCO 500 kW Community Solar Project
Power to the People…
Orcas Power and Light, (OPALCO) is the host of this community solar project on Decatur Island. This is one of the Utilities steps using solar and energy storage to improve its resiliency in case the mainland electrical grid fails and cuts out power to the island.
Puget Sound Solar designed and installed the solar photovoltaics in 2018. This was a challenging project because all the solar panels, inverters, racking, wiring and other materials had to be barged over from the mainland and then trucked to the site adjacent to an existing OPALCO substation. The property wasn’t being used by the utility, so it was chosen as the site of the first of OPALCO’s planned solar projects.
The objective was to supply at least 500 kilowatts of DC rated power and this was done with (1344) LG Solar 375W & (6) Yaskawa Solectria solar PV inverters PVI 60TL on SunModo ground mount racks.
A transformer was connected on the PV side by Puget Sound Solar and on the other side by OPALCO crew who had been on site to install some upgrades to the substation as well as the solar feeder.
The solar array has since been connected to a 1-MW, 2.6-MWh battery back-up system, capable of powering the islands 500 homes for about 4 hours.
This is the first of several microgrids planned by OPALCO to improve the resiliency and independence of the San Juan Islands which, to date has been reliant upon power transmitted from the mainland.
Puget Sound Solar can design and install a similar or smaller version of this kind of solar + storage option for your home or business so you’re prepared in case of weather, natural or man-made disaster impacts our region and our electrical grid. We install battery back-up systems from Tesla, Enphase and LG for homeowners and industrial sized systems for large, commercial scale projects, like the one we’re currently building for the microgrid project at Miller Community Center, that will be Seattle’s first microgrid.
Check out the OPALCO Decatur Island Microgrid Tour. Nice PSS truck. ?
