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Silver City Continues Work On Solar Project

  Silver City, NM--Work is progressing at the Wastewater Treatment Facility six acre Solar Array, and on schedule to be operational in June.  An impressive spread of 3,949 photovoltaic panels is mounted on the site and the wiring is buried in conduit beneath them.  Pat Casey, owner of C-5 Construction in Silver City, has been under contract for the trenching work for the extensive underground electrical conduit runs. C-5 has also been involved in other earth work and will be building protective structures on the facility.

Ryan Centerwall, General Manager for the project at Affordable Solar in Albuquerque said “the only big piece of equipment left to install is the large transformer, which is due the first week of June and will be installed upon arrival”. The large transformer will replace three of the current transformers that are used to connect to the PNM power grid.

Affordable Solar’s on-site Operations Manager, Blake Richards said the project has gone smoothly, and added "It has been, and continues to be a pleasure working with the Town of Silver City's administrative staff and field service employees. All Affordable Solar Installation employees share in the same thoughts of enjoyment to be able to work with the townspeople in such an outdoor environment next to the Gila National Forest. We can't thank the town enough for the opportunities that they have presented to Affordable Solar." 

The Town of Silver City’s Office of Sustainability in the Community Development Department arranged what is called a “Power Purchase Agreement”  (PPA) with Affordable Solar from Albuquerque. Affordable Solar finances, installs, owns and maintains the system, and The Town of Silver City agrees to purchase power from them for a 20 year contract period at greatly reduced rates. Over the 20 year contract period, the Town is expected to save approximately 4 million dollars.

A christening ceremony of the array will be held on June 25th from 9:00 to 10:00am.  For more information, contact Mike Sauber at 575-654-3906.