Renewable Energy for Schools
Wind power, solar PV and computer monitoring system
Inverclyde Academy is an educational environment fit for the 21st century built under the Prudential Funding scheme. It incorporates several environmental and renewable energy schemes undertaken to reduce the schools carbon footprint and to try and protect the school from fossil fuel increases, which detracts vital funding from the education budget.
The school, a 1100 pupil merger between Greenock High School and Wellington Academy, is expected to complete autumn 2008 with an estimated cost of just over £26M.
|
|
||||||||||||||||
|
Image courtesy of Studio E Architects
|
|
|
Image courtesy of Studio E Architects
|
Wind turbine
The school is crowned with a 25m high Entegrity EW50 50kW wind turbine which was installed by Perpetual Energy Ltd.
The turbine is expected to produce around 80,000kWh of electricity for the school and will therefore contribute an estimated 20% of the schools electrical demand.
The turbine is the first 50kW turbine to be supplied to a UK school on a monopole tower. This was selected over a lattice tower due to the aesthetics and security.
In early 2008 the turbine will be commissioned and will be operational before the school opens to pupils.
Solar PV
The funding for renewables also allowed for the inclusion of solar PV, which was more for educational benefits than return on investment.
Perpetual Energy recommended 4
BP 170W Solar PV panels as they represented a good balance between value and quality.
The panels will allow pupils to understand the benefits of solar technology compared
to that of wind.
The 680Wp array will produce a small amount of electricity which will directly feed into the school's main distribution board via a Sunny-Boy Inverter from SMA.
The installation has been deliberately kept to a demonstration size so that more
money can be invested in a display system that combines all technologies and a weather
station.
Monitoring and control system
Perpetual Energy was also asked by the client for a child-friendly display that could be used as an education tool as well as a display for the reception area. A fully customised web-based display system was the solution that was most practical allowing all children to log in to the display from any networked school computer.
The display will integrate both wind and solar systems alongside inputs from the national grid (to monitor imported electricity) and a small weather station. This is presented with a GUI front-end with lots of real-time tabular data behind so that it can be used by all ages.
The graphical front-end will be displayed in the reception area on a large LCD TV and can be dialled into by any PC on a secure connection using the unique IP address and passwords. Thus allowing flexible learning and the opportunity to display in as many areas as required for a relatively low cost compared to standard LED display technologies which look dated.
Other environmental aspects
The school is also being built with environmentally friendly aspects such as Natural Ventilation, Natural Lighting, Boundary Plantings, Nature Garden and a Recycling area. These features combined with the onsite generation make this school one of the leaders in the field of modern, environmentally friendly schools that others aspire to.
As you can see from the chart below, a solid recycling strategy is just as important as onsite generation and energy efficiency. Schools are the largest contributors of waste in terms of Council Public Buildings and therefore present an opportunity in terms of waste recycling.
|