Solar Carports Project Underway At South Huntington Schools

SOUTH HUNTINGTON, NY — Solar carports are being built in the parking lots of six South Huntington schools, the district announced.

The project's goals are to produce energy savings, reduce the schools' carbon footprint and help the environment, the district wrote.

Carports are being constructed at Walt Whitman High School, Stimson Middle School, Silas Wood Sixth Grade Center, Birchwood Intermediate School, Countrywood Primary Center, and Oakwood Primary Center.

Maplewood Intermediate School and the James Kaden Administrative Offices' abundance of trees and shaded areas lack enough sun exposure for the carports to work, the district said.

The solar carports provide shaded parking while the canopy of photovoltaic (PV) solar panels overhead convert sunlight into electrical energy. That electricity is metered and then "taken off" the kilowatt-hours that each school consumes.

The New York State Department of Education is calling on school districts to continually look for and implement programs and procedures that will save energy and provide cost savings, according to South Huntington.

An audit assessed the school district's energy consumption and found areas where energy was being wasted or used inefficiently. The district then began planning and designing the carport project in 2020. It includes the installation of the solar carports, new boilers, energy efficient LED lighting, and building envelope upgrades districtwide to save the district money on its electric bills as well as gas bills.

"We're excited to be able to utilize renewable energy and see a cost savings to the district," said South Huntington Superintendent Vito D’Elia. "Plus new boilers, new LED lighting, the district will benefit tremendously from upgraded energy performance."

Johnson Controls, the energy services company that developed and is overseeing the project, says the district will realize more than 47 percent of energy savings from the baseline measurement period and will save more than $707K per year over the length of the Energy Performance Contract (EPC). The savings are guaranteed by Johnson Controls, which will continually measure and verify the performance of the installations at agreed-upon checkpoints built into the contract.

The first solar carport construction started at Stimson Middle School because the new side parking lot was being installed.

Work is progressing in the parking lot by the North Gym at Walt Whitman High School.

Carport construction has begun, or is about to begin, at the other school buildings and is expected to be completed by the end of the year. While construction will still be going on in some locations when school starts, D’Elia said the work will be done during non-instructional hours.

"The district was also very cognizant of how these solar arrays would look aesthetically," D’Elia said. "We had a choice of going to the front of Birchwood, the front of Oakwood, but we didn’t. We decided we could get just as much light from the side parking lots."

The solar carports won’t only provide savings opportunities for the district, but will also provide learning opportunities for South Huntington students. The district is looking for ways to tie the solar structures, how they work, and what they do for the environment, into its curriculum.

Johnson Controls has worked with other school districts where it has installed solar carports to speak with STEM class students and/or clubs to demonstrate how the solar arrays operate.