SunEdison, Inc. has signed an agreement with Macalester College in Saint Paul, Minnesota in the USA to offset all college’s electricity use with solar energy.
Macalester College will be one of the first colleges to participate in SunEdison’s community solar gardens program, which enables participants to reap the benefits of solar electricity even when they are unable to install arrays at their own facilities.
Not only will the college add to its already long history of environmental and energy efficiency efforts through the arrangement, the power bill savings will be huge.
“Given our projected consumption patterns and the expected rising trend in electricity rates over the period of the agreement, we believe that the savings over the term of the agreement could be in the millions of dollars,” said the College’s Vice President for Finance and Administration, David Wheaton. “Those savings will begin as soon as the solar gardens are operational and will benefit both current and future students.”
SunEdison says it plans to commence construction of the community solar gardens in 2015, with view to starting commercial operation in 2016.
“We expect to see more schools, colleges, and universities follow Macalester College’s lead and take advantage of the solar gardens program in the near future,” said Sam Youneszadeh, Managing Director of Distributed Generation Western USA at SunEdison.
In other recent news from SunEdison, the company announced late last week the appointment of Cathy Zoi as Chief Executive Officer responsible for developing SunEdison’s rural electric utility company.
Ms. Zoi, currently a Consulting Professor at Stanford University, has three decades of experience in the energy and environmental sectors. Among her many high-profile positions, she was the founding CEO of the Alliance for Climate Protection and Acting Under Secretary and Assistant Secretary in the U.S. Department of Energy in the Obama Administration.
Ms. Zoi also has a strong connection to Australia; where she spent 12 years and was CEO of the Sustainable Energy Development Authority, an initiative to commercialize greenhouse-friendly technologies in Australia.
SunEdison’s rural electric utility company has set a goal of bringing clean electricity to 20 million new or underserved customers by 2020.
