By Lyonel Doherty
Oliver’s newest park on Fairview Road will be powered by four, 370-watt solar panels.
The panels were installed today by Argon Electrical and Solar Services.
The panels are designed the operate the water feature (fountain) and lights.
Argon manager Dave Malmberg said the pole-mounted panels will be angled at 50 degrees in wintertime to take full advantage of the lower sun, while summertime will see them angled at 20 degrees.
He agreed that years ago this would have been viewed as something straight out of science fiction.
“What are those crazy guys doing up there?”
Malmberg said it’s nice to see local government take leadership by showing people that you don’t need fossil fuels for power.
He noted that solar is the easiest and cleanest of renewable energy, and once it’s installed, there’s no maintenance.
“You put it up and forget about it; you don’t need to clean it.”
Malmberg said he envisions, in 10 years, everyone will have some sort of energy storage (backup) capability at home.
“To take care of solar overnight it can collect it during the day and give it back to you.”
Eventually what will happen is there will be so many people with solar that electric companies won’t want to do net metering anymore, Malmberg said.
When Argon first started installing solar four years ago, the modules were 250 watts; now they are 370 to 400.
He said people are starting to see that solar power makes financial sense, especially when they see governments using this technology.
