School board pursues two solar partnerships

After taking the month to research Red Lion Renewable’s solar proposal, the Creston School Board heard an additional proposal Monday at their monthly meeting. Despite the last-minute addition, the school board voted unanimously to pursue both projects.

David Vollmar of Alliant Energy shared information on an available program. “It’s a pilot program through the Iowa Utilities Board called customer-hosted solar,” he explained. “What we would do is we put in a solar field for whatever size we would agree on that would be the right size, and it just goes back out on the grid.”

Last month, Terry Dvorak proposed a solar service power agreement where Red Lion would place a solar field in the grassy area west of the high school, middle school and bus barn.

“I think you might be able to do both,” Vollmar said. “As long as he’s not affecting your peak, you can do customer hosted and still work with Red Lion.”

Alliant’s proposal works as a land lease agreement. Vollmar’s estimate is a $35,000 payout to the school annually in exchange for the land. “We’re like a farmer leasing that ground,” he said. “We’re taking care of it.”

The Red Lion proposal aims to lower the $300,000 the school district pays in electricity each year. “We’re working on that $300,000 to the tune of $45,000 in savings potentially in year one and then going up as you go,” Dvorak said. “So over 30 years, we’re talking about $3.7 million.”

The board turned to Maintenance Director Gary Briley for his opinion on approving both projects.

“I believe we have 7 acres out there in that alfalfa field,“ he said. “If we can work out where there’s enough space to do both, I have no problem with doing both.”

Vollmar said he already enrolled the school in the program to hold their place, but he couldn’t provide a timeline estimate.

Dvorak was confident Red Lion would be able to create a plan working around the space Alliant is using. “The amount of space he is talking about isn’t the whole space we planned to use. You could potentially lease out half of that acreage to this capacity Alliant has,” he suggested. “The other half we can still have ground mounts. Then we have some canopies to cover the piece that’s leased by Alliant.”

While the parking lot canopies were an option discussed, the board would prefer to find more ground space for the project.

“I’d like to put it somewhere less auspicious,” Board member Galen Zumbach said.

Options including between the baseball and softball fields, the gravel parking lot and covered bleachers at the football field were discussed.

The Red Lion project is contingent upon securing a USDA grant. “USDA has a grant program we can apply for but the school can’t,” Dvorak explained last month. “The grant has an application process. We have to apply for it before March. We may not know until July or August.”

Red Lion has been around for eight years and primarily provides solar power for schools and cities. “We have systems that are five years old and we have 101 systems that generate electricity in Iowa right now,” he said. “We probably do 80% or more of the power purchase agreements in Iowa.”

Though the board was hesitant on whether both projects could work simultaneously, the agreement with Red Lion is a conditional letter of intent to work together in good faith on the conditions of receiving the USDA grant and the project not affecting the Alliant land lease.

“The way he described it, we’re really not impacting them,” Dvorak said. “We can design around it and get the best of both worlds.”

With the USDA grant deadline in March, Dvorak said by this time next month, the details will be ironed out.

Should the grant be secured, the project could begin before the end of 2023 should supplies be available, but due to inventory and shipping delays, it may be spring 2024 before it’s able to begin.