With a solar City Hall and a reputation for a progressive attitude backed up by concrete action, Satellite Beach has become a “shining example” for both sustainability and resiliency.
Leading by example and made official with a Nov. 2 ribbon-cutting ceremony, the city chose its City Hall and Civic Center at 565 Cassia Blvd. for its first municipal solar array. Among the reasons: it has a large flat roof with little to no pre-existing rooftop instillations that would be in the way; the roof itself has an estimated 17 years of life left in it; and there is direct sunlight with no shade allowing for complete optimization of the systems capabilities when the sun is out, said Environmental Programs Coordinator Nick Sanzone.
But the best reason for the array location may be because the City Hall/Civic Center is highly visible to the public and now is equipped with a live display in the lobby showing residents real-time proof of the progress. In in only 35 days the array generated 7,263 KW of energy and abated 5.5 tons of CO2, he said.
And Sanzone noted during the ceremony that the progress has been made in a relatively short period of time.
The city’s Sustainability Action Plan, including the idea for a municipal solar array, was adopted on May 3, 2017. A request for proposals for the project was sent out on June 16, 2017. ESA Solar won the bid for the work early this year and the solar array became operational on Sept. 27.
It was the first municipal building with a solar array installed by ESA Solar, but they had discussed a similar but larger project for the Orlando City Hall building, said ESA Vice President Justin Vandenbroeck.
ESA Solar’s original focus was on large solar farms up to 300 acres, and the company also has done hundreds of homes in Florida and elsewhere.
“Even though this array is relatively small with 232 panels, it is about 10 times larger than the average home and it’s going to offset 95 percent of the city’s electric build over the 25-year life of the project,’’ he said.
One unique aspect for the Satellite Beach project is special hardware, cabinets and closures to combat the corrosive saltwater environment, he said.
The first phase of the City Hall project is for power generation, with future phases possibly including battery storage for use when all other power is out. Currently the city has a large generator at City Hall. “When the grid goes down, the solar project shuts down, but the generator kicks on so they still have emergency backup facilities there,’’ he said.
