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Our solar energy program offsets 10,500 tons of carbon emissions, equal to taking 1,500 cars off the road annually. Our goal is to do more.

Spotlight: Solar

We’ve installed nearly 6,000 solar modules similar to the one in this photo all over our campus, on building tops, above parking lots, and in other locations where they catch the sun and also provide shade below.

UC San Diego, Borrego Solar, Kyocera, and Envision Solar partnered to install a 1 megawatt solar electric system on our main La Jolla campus. The system will supply about 1.5 million kilowatt-hours of green energy per year. Here’s how it works:

• Solar Power Partners owns the $9 million system and supplies financing, project oversight, and long-term operations.
• Kyocera provides photovoltaic modules, the central components of the energy system.
• Envision Solar designed the Solar Groves.
• UC San Diego allows access to parking structures, rooftops, and other locations for installation.
• Borrego Solar installs the solar modules.
• Solar Power Partners supplies some of the generated electricity to the campus at a discount and sells the rest.

For the next phase of this project, we’ve identified campus sites to host an additional 1 megawatt of solar panels. More about solar power.

More about 2.0 clean energy

• UC San Diego is collaborating with UC Davis in a California Solar Energy Collaborative, the first-ever statewide solar collaborative sponsored by the California Energy Commission.
• UC San Diego is building a methane-powered fuel-cell that will provide 2.8 megawatts of energy. Nearby regional renewable methane will be used to power the fuel-cell.
• In the desert, winds typically blow at night, so desert wind farms create excess renewable power at a time when users need it the least. But UC San Diego is a 24-hour, 365-day operation. We can use this excess wind power at night, allowing energy suppliers to balance their loads. We can then throttle back our cogeneration plant and take advantage of this lower-cost wind energy that might otherwise go unused.

Ongoing projects

• UC San Diego’s 3.8M gallon Thermal Energy Storage shifts 14% of our energy load to off-peak periods every day. Our goal is to shift 20% of our load by 2011.