Backwell & Cleeve Community Energy Group are all volunteers living in the local area, some of whom have kids at West Leigh School. It was while standing in the queue to pick up his daughter that Darren Hall, our project manager, noticed the big flat roof that was just perfect for a solar array. When he asked the school about it, the Lighthouse Schools Partnership (LSP) Trust was delighted to support the idea.
The school's electricity bill is approximately £15,000 per year and with a 44kW array, 60-70% of that can be generated by the solar panels. As it happens, there is a good fit between daylight (and hopefully sunny) hours and the school's use of energy, so a higher than usual proportion can be used on site. Then, at weekends and in school holidays the spare energy can be sold back to the grid for a profit - estimated to be around £4000 per year depending on the price of a unit of electricity.
So if the system is operational for 25 years, it could save the school over £300,000.
The system has been designed so that a battery can be fitted at a future date, further increasing the amount of energy that can be used on site, but we plan to monitor the system for 12 months to see whether that would be a good return on investment.
We all share the hope that we can do something significant to help tackle climate change at the same time as saving precious school budget that can be better spent on the kids than given to an energy company.
Thank you very much for taking the time to read about our project, and especially for any support that you feel you are able to give.