Harrimans Solar Connects P.R.E.C. First PV System
(An excerpt taken from the Solar Electric Power Association (SEPA) Newsletter – April 11, 2008)
Another utility in the Sunshine State has decided to generate electricity with Florida’s most abundant fuel. According to Tom Harriman, owner of Harriman’s Solar based in Venice Florida, the Peace River Electric Cooperative brought its first-ever grid-connected PV system into existence when residential customer George Palermo, a well-established local architect, threw the switch last month.
The customer’s motives? Help the environment and reduce costs, of course. That’s why he chose the 4.8 kW system. The State of Florida kicked in with a rebate in the amount of $20,000.
Peace River managers saved a lot of trouble by checking with other coops who had already gone solar. Interconnection agreements and meter selections were already in place somewhere nearby. Harriman: “Why reinvent the wheel? The process gets a lot smoother once a few other utilities have already done it. Their
people were easy to deal with.”
Peace River Utility will be remotely monitoring this new installation to collect data on the system's performance.
