Cloverdale gives green light to solar project

Cloverdale, one of Sonoma County’s perennial hot and sunny spots, is known as a good place to grow tomatoes. It’s also well situated for a solar power array.

The city is moving forward with harnessing the sun’s energy to run its water and wastewater treatment plants, a project expected to save $3.5 million in electricity costs over a couple decades and also enable the municipality to exceed its greenhouse gas reduction goals.

The City Council on Wednesday night found there were no significant negative environmental impacts associated with the project and on 4-0 vote authorized the city manager to execute a site license agreement with SolEd Benefit of San Rafael to develop the solar project. It’s expected to be built by late spring.

“It’s a win-win for everybody. The state likes it. It’s good for the company. It’s good for the city. Everybody’s happy,” Mayor Bob Cox said Thursday.

Most of the discussion among council members was to ensure shrubs and small trees get planted to screen the solar panels at the water treatment plant from the view of people using the path of nearby River Park.

The 1 megawatt total array is actually part of a number of other smaller solar projects that are being implemented in the coming year in Sonoma, Napa and Marin counties under a cooperative purchasing approach that allows the dozen or so participating agencies to save money as well as generate a total of 6.8 megawatts of solar capacity.

One megawatt is approximately enough to provide electricity to 200 homes.

In Sonoma County, the agencies include Cloverdale, Cotati, the county Water Agency and the Sonoma County Retirement Association.

Cotati is installing a 105-kilowatt system to power City Hall and its police department. The county Retirement Association installed a 100-kilowatt array on its roof. And the water agency plans a 60-kilowatt system for its Geyserville treatment plant.

The consulting firm Optony of San Rafael, backed by a grant from California Solar Initiative, a state program to accelerate development of solar projects, has been instrumental in moving things forward.

Optony, along with the nonprofit group Strategic Energy Innovations, oversees a revolving fund to assess potential sites and help develop projects for school districts and local public agencies at no upfront cost.

When the projects get approved, the contractor that installs the systems is able to buy in bulk the solar panels and other components to reduce costs.

Financing for Cloverdale’s $1.8 million array is being obtained through Sunetric, a Hawaii-based company owned by RGS Energy. The contractor plans to buy “high-quality” panels from a manufacturer in Georgia.

The city doesn’t pay for construction or own the solar installation, but agrees to buy the energy produced. If the system doesn’t perform, the city can revert to buying energy from its electricity provider, Sonoma Clean Power.

The Cloverdale solar panels are expected to cut back on more than 1,000 metric tons of pollutants and greenhouse gases over a couple of decades. Besides being better for the environment, the power bill for the water and wastewater plant is projected to be 33 percent cheaper than the rates provided by Sonoma Clean Power, said Craig Scott, Cloverdale’s public works director and engineer.

“There’s no question the most significant benefit to us is the projected savings to our ratepayers,” he said.

The solar array is designed to provide almost 100 percent of the power for each Cloverdale utility plant in the course of the year, Scott said.

City officials say the solar power generation allows the city to lock in a low electricity rate, hedging against anticipated future utility rate increases.

Cloverdale will agree to pay fixed rates over the 20-year life of the contract starting at 17 cents per kilowatt hour, a price expected to be a substantial savings over electricity from the grid.

“There is a risk if electricity costs just stay stable or go down,” Scott acknowledged.

But with energy prices settling into a trend of about 4 percent annual increases, Optony Senior Project Manager Jonathan Whelan said “it’s very unlikely” electricity rates will be going down.

You can reach Staff Writer Clark Mason at 521-5214 or clark.mason@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter@clarkmas