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Environmental Learning Centre at Island Lake Public School plans to pay its own way

MEDIA RELEASE

For Immediate Release
April 29, 2010

GUELPH, Ontario — The Upper Grand District School Board and Orangeville Hydro are pleased to announce the connection of the fist micro Feed-In Tariff (F.I.T.) hydro generation project in Orangeville.

The board’s unique Environment Learning Centre at Island Lake Public School generates its own electricity though renewable resources with a windmill and photo voltaic (PV) panels installed on the facility’s roof. Electricity generated by the windmill is used to operate the centre. If there’s more power generated than is needed to run the centre, the extra power is sent off to the grid.

The electricity generated by the PV panels is now supplied to the grid under the terms of the F.I.T. program outlined in the Ontario Energy Act. Orangeville Hydro reimburses the board for it at a rate of 80.2 cents per kilowatt/hour.

“It’s a win-win situation for both of us”, says Paul Scinocca, the board’s Manger of Capital Projects. “The Learning Centre provides needed classroom space for students, and sends power from renewable resources for Orangeville Hydro which they can distribute to other customers in the Town.”

The centre, which was Scinocca’s brainchild, is more than just two elementary classrooms. It introduces grade 5 students to environmental education concepts through curriculum that highlights how the space works. Built with straw bale construction, the addition of a windmill and photo-voltaic cells that generate electricity from the wind and the sun, the Centre can also be used as a demonstration classroom for students from across the board.

“It could not have been done without the enthusiastic and generous support of Orangeville Hydro, and the board’s trustees, who embraced the idea wholeheartedly from the start,” Scinocca says.

“While we’re not yet to a point where we can say the centre operates at no cost to the board, that’s a target we’re aiming at meeting in the future. 

“The best thing is that it really brings environmental education alive for students. And that’s the biggest pay off of all.”

The board welcomes staff, students and the general public to follow the production of electricity by the centre at the following website: https://enlighten.enphaseenergy.com/public/systems/hrbH1162.

For more Information: Paul Scinocca, Capital Projects Manager, Upper Grand DSB 519-822-4420 ext. 847, Maggie McFadzen, Communications Officer, ext. 725, or Rob Koekkoek, Orangeville Hydro 519-942-8000

Categories: Media Releases