Lighthouse May Go Solar

By next year, the caretaker’s cottage at Lighthouse Point might be catching rays — through 20 solar panels.

That’s the hope of the city’s Office of Sustainability and the Board of Parks Commissioners too.

After hearing a presentation Wednesday night by Giovanni Zinn, an environmental consultant for the sustainability office, the commissioners swiftly approved the solar panel installation. Final approval must come from the Board of Aldermen.

The panels and their installation would be fully paid for by the Connecticut Clean Energy Fund, which is rewarding New Haven for its various government and citizen efforts to support clean energy since 2005. Zinn estimated that buying 20 comparable solar panels on the open market right now would cost about $25,000.

Although the panels would be located on the roof of the caretaker’s cottage, all the energy they produce would be used to help power the decorative light at the top of the lighthouse as well as the ground lights that illuminate the lighthouse at night. Zinn (at right in photo) said the panels would produce between 4,000 and 5,000 kilowatt hours (about $1,000 worth of electricity) per year.

That would be about a third of the lighthouse’s yearly energy needs, Zinn said. As Parks Director Bob Levine pointed out at the commissioners’ meeting, ​“The lighthouse is an icon of New Haven, so having it lit by solar energy would be a symbol of our commitment [to sustainable energy use].”

Zinn agreed, adding that the panels could help residents learn about sustainable energy, especially if the panels are placed in such a well-traveled area. ​“We [at the Office of Sustainability] want a place where the panels will make a significant dent [in energy needs], be highly visible and have an educational value,” he said after his presentation to the commissioners.

Parks Commissioner and Fair Haven Alderwoman Migdalia Castro asked Zinn how easily the solar panels could be broken by vandals throwing rocks, for instance. ​“The panels are designed to withstand hail and 75 mph winds, so they’re pretty hard to damage,” Zinn said.

Commissioner Kevin Walton asked who would be responsible for paying the repair costs in case the panels did get damaged. Zinn responded that the city would have to foot the bill, adding that the panels have a lifetime of around 30 years. The converter, which channels the panel-produced energy into the main electric grid, would last about 15 years before needing a replacement. (The commissioners and aldermen could of course choose whether or not to make a replacement.)

The consensus among the commissioners was that the solar panels would be a risk-free gift, not a Trojan horse. They quickly voted to approve the installation. ​“Free solar panels don’t fall from the sky every day,” Levine noted.

Zinn hopes that approval from the Board of Aldermen will come by September. (Before getting a vote from the full Board, the plan needs a go-ahead from the City Services and Environmental Policy Committee, which may discuss the issue at its August meeting.)

If the 20 proposed solar panels are installed at the lighthouse cottage, they would represent four of the 24 kilowatts’ worth of solar panels promised to New Haven so far by the Clean Energy Fund. The first two of those 24 kilowatts were placed on the roof of Common Ground High School in West Rock earlier this year. The lighthouse project would be the second New Haven installation paid for by the Fund.