{"id":2897,"date":"2013-04-09T09:38:18","date_gmt":"2013-04-09T13:38:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/?p=2897"},"modified":"2014-06-04T08:22:09","modified_gmt":"2014-06-04T12:22:09","slug":"ikea-biggest-solar-in-georgia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2013\/04\/ikea-biggest-solar-in-georgia.html","title":{"rendered":"IKEA biggest solar in Georgia"},"content":{"rendered":"

\r\n\r\n<\/a>\r\nThe biggest solar rooftop installation in Georgia?\r\nNot by mighty Georgia Power, not by an EMC, not even by GaSU:\r\nit’s IKEA’s distribution center in Chatham County.\r\nChatham is also trailing only Atlanta in solar installations in general.\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\nMary Landers wrote for Savannahnow.com 7 January 2013,\r\n\r\nNew solar adds to Chatham’s growing inventory<\/a>,\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\n

\r\nJust in time for the new year, and for a tax break for the old one,\r\nConsolidated Utilities began producing electricity from solar panels\r\nat its water treatment plant in west Chatham County on the afternoon\r\nof New Year’s Eve.\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\n“When I left on Monday the meter was receiving power,”\r\nsaid Tony Abbott, president of Consolidated Utilities, a private\r\nlocal water company.\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\nThe 416-panel, 100-kilowatt system is big enough to power about 10\r\naverage homes for 25 years, said Julian Smith, of SolarSmith, which\r\ninstalled the system. At the water treatment site, however, solar\r\nwill instead power the blowers that keep the sewage ponds aerated.\r\nThe panels occupy previously useless property in a flood zone, Smith\r\nnoted.\r\n<\/p>\r\n<\/blockquote>\r\n

\r\nOK, the\r\nWiregrass Solar installation at Valdosta’s Mud Creek Wastewater\r\nTreatment Plant<\/a> is larger, and the Valdosta City Council recently\r\nvoted to expand it further.\r\nGo Valdosta!\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\nBut what about IKEA?\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\n

\r\nIt’s not the largest solar installation in the county. That honor\r\nstill goes to the IKEA distribution center, which in October plugged\r\nin its 1,460-kilowatt solar array on the roof of its distribution\r\ncenter. That IKEA installation is in fact the largest in the state.\r\n<\/p>\r\n<\/blockquote>\r\n

\r\nBack in July I mentioned that\r\n\r\nIKEA was going to build that array<\/a>,\r\nand IKEA was building almost as much solar as all of Georgia Power’s\r\nparent Southern Company.\r\nBusinessWire reported 9 Oct 2012\r\n\r\nIKEA Plugs-In Georgia\u2019s Largest Private Solar Rooftop Array on Savannah Distribution Center: Surpasses 75% U.S. Solar Presence<\/a>.\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\n

\r\nThis installation represents the 34th<\/sup><\/small> \r\ncompleted solar project for IKEA in the U.S., with five more\r\nlocations underway, making the eventual U.S. solar presence of IKEA\r\nnearly 89% of its U.S. locations, generating with a total 38 MW.\r\nIKEA owns and operates each of its solar PV energy systems atop its\r\nbuildings — as opposed to a solar lease or PPA (power purchase\r\nagreement) — and globally has allocated \u20ac590 million to\r\ninvest in renewable energy, focusing on solar and wind during the\r\ncoming three years. This investment reinforces the long-term\r\ncommitment of IKEA to sustainability and confidence in photovoltaic\r\n(PV) technology. More than 250,000 solar panels have been installed\r\non IKEA stores and buildings across the world. The company also owns\r\nand\/or operates approximately 110 wind turbines in Europe.\r\n<\/p>\r\n<\/blockquote>\r\n

\r\nThe Savannahnow article mentions something\r\nhappening in Chatham County but not so much yet in Lowndes County:\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\n

\r\n“What’s really going on in Chatham is that lots of homeowners\r\nput solar on their rooftops,” Arora said. “The\r\nexcitement exists in Chatham for solar.”\r\n<\/p>\r\n<\/blockquote>\r\n

\r\n -jsq\r\n<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The biggest solar rooftop installation in Georgia? Not by mighty Georgia Power, not by an EMC, not even by GaSU: it’s IKEA’s distribution center in Chatham County. Chatham is also trailing only Atlanta in solar installations in general. Mary Landers wrote for Savannahnow.com 7 January 2013, New solar adds to Chatham’s growing inventory, Just in […]","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[14,8,18,23,24],"tags":[1255,8704,8701,8708,2104,8702,12,7,8713,637,8714,108,6],"class_list":["post-2897","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-economy","category-georgia","category-georgia-power","category-renewable-energy","category-solar","tag-chatham-county","tag-economy","tag-georgia","tag-georgia-power","tag-ikea","tag-lake","tag-lowndes-area-knowledge-exchange","tag-lowndes-county","tag-renewable-energy","tag-rooftop","tag-solar","tag-southern-company","tag-valdosta"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p585fK-KJ","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2897","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2897"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2897\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9267,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2897\/revisions\/9267"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2897"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2897"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2897"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}