Portland Now Has Largest Solar Array in the Northwest
[social_buttons]
The largest rooftop solar array in the Pacific Northwest was finished this week. Portland General Electric (PGE) announced on Monday that it just finished the $14 million solar project that it started building in March. The array covers the roofs of seven distribution warehouses and has 2.4 MW worth of solar panels.
Energy Trust of Oregon was one of several project partners that made this happen. It put up $2 million in incentives to help complete the project.
Energy Trust of Oregon’s director of energy programs, Peter West, says: “This installation shows the potential for cultivating the rooftop real estate of Oregon to generate clean, renewable energy.”
PGE, which put these solar arrays on ProLogis warehouses, now has 14.3 MW of solar capacity and more than 10.7 MW of customer-owned solar energy projects (supported through its net metering program). Its total capacity through partnerships with Prologis is 3.5 MW.
“Solar is clearly growing in Oregon and our customers are helping drive that. We have seen unprecedented growth of residential and business solar projects in our area over the past two years which, coupled with the growth in solar manufacturing, helps develop more clean, renewable resources for the region and stimulate Oregon’s green economy.”, said PGE’s vice president of customers and economic development, Carol Dillin.
PGE expects that its percentage of renewable energy will reach nearly 9% in 2010. If it continues on like this, Oregon’s target of 25% renewable energy by 2025 should be pretty easily attainable.
Other than Prologis and Energy Trust of Oregon, other partners on the project include U.S. Bancorp Community Development Corporation, PV Powered, Frahler Electric, and Tonkon Torp. Additionally, the project received funding from PGE’s Clean Wind program, a program geared at funding renewable energy projects in the region.
Like this article? Connect with me on Facebook or Twitter
Photo Credit: Jeremy Levine Design via flickr
Sign up for CleanTechnica's Weekly Substack for Zach and Scott's in-depth analyses and high level summaries, sign up for our daily newsletter, and follow us on Google News!
Whether you have solar power or not, please complete our latest solar power survey.
Have a tip for CleanTechnica? Want to advertise? Want to suggest a guest for our CleanTech Talk podcast? Contact us here.
Sign up for our daily newsletter for 15 new cleantech stories a day. Or sign up for our weekly one on top stories of the week if daily is too frequent.
CleanTechnica uses affiliate links. See our policy here.
CleanTechnica's Comment Policy
