 I have been blessed to be part of the solar industry in California since 2005. The Central Valley is one of the best places in the world for solar technology and it has been exciting to see it evolve. This section is for registered users (friends and students). email me for login information.
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I’ve been working at a non-profit organization, Proteus, as a solar instructor since March 2010. It’s been a challenge but it’s my students that keep me going. So far I have had 16 individuals take my 6-week, 210 hour class. When I first started developing curriculum and labs for the class I wasn’t sure how to structure it. Diane Vessels, who herself developed energy efficiency curriculum, told me that” if you expect a lot from your students, they’ll rise to the occasion”. The program is evolving. I’ve taken Diane’s advice and so far, it’s been true.
One of my former students, Francisco Navarro, is one that has risen to the occasion overcoming familiar obstacles that are all too common for young people, especially for those that live on the west side of Fresno County. But he has talent that few at my school realized and it deserves to be recognized.
Francisco was born in Mexico and lives in Huron. He took my 6-week solar class and then continued on with Peter Tapia’s weatherization training here in Kerman. He is now working in an unrelated industry but the Kerman team is working hard to get him a good paying job in what he was trained in; either solar or weatherization.
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Read more... [Francisco Navarro]
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Large Solar PV Installations in the Central Valley |
 As part of the Photovoltaics for Utility Scale Applications Applications (PVUSA) Project Pacific Gas Electric Company (PG&E) built the Kerman 500-kW photovoltaic power plant. Located near the end of a distribution feeder in a rural section of Fresno County, the plant was not built so much to demonstrate PV technology, but to evaluate its interaction with the local distribution grid and quantify available nontraditional grid-support benefits (those other than energy and capacity). As demand for new generation began to languish in the 1980s, and siting and permitting of power plants and transmission lines became more involved, utilities began considering smaller, distributed power sources. Potential benefits include shorter construction lead time, less capital outlay, and better utilization of existing assets. The results of a PG&E study in 1990/1991 of the benefits from a PV system to the distribution grid prompted the PVUSA Project to construct a plant at Kerman. Completed in 1993, the plant is believed to be the first one specifically built to evaluate the multiple benefits to the grid of a strategically sited plant. Each of nine discrete benefits were evaluated in detail by first establishing the technical impact, then translating the results into present economic value. Benefits span the entire system from distribution feeder to the generation fleet. This work breaks new ground in evaluation of distributed resources, and suggests that resource planning practices be expanded to account for these non-traditional benefits. |
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SOLARTHON 2010 will be held on Saturday, October 2nd, from 8:30 to 4:30 in Fresno, California. This event is a huge solar block party and fundraiser where GRID Alternatives Central Valley will be leading individual and corporate work crews to install solar for several low-income families in one neighborhood in one day. Many of these families will will be working alongside Solarthon event participants to provide "sweat equity" as they help install their solar electric systems.
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Read more... [Solarthon- Fresno]
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Proteus Solar Class, Kerman |
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