DEC 15

When we think of all the businesses and institutions that we'd like to see embrace renewable energy, prisons don't immediately pop to mind, but huge correctional facilities require a lot of electricity to run and the large flat spaces they most often occupy make them perfect for solar power.

Most recently, two Illinois correctional facilities in Merced County have announced that they'll be running on solar power.  Two arrays consisting of 6,272 solar panels located on land adjacent to the two facilities have a capacity of 1.4 MW and will be able to provide 70 percent of the facilities' peak electricity consumption and all of the power during off-peak times.

The arrays plus new energy-efficient lighting systems being installed will reduce CO2 emissions by 999.85 tons.  The cost savings will be substantial too.  The county expects to save $300,000 a year on energy costs creating a positive cash flow that could total $9 million in 25 years.

Four California correctional facilities announced in October that they'd be installing solar arrays as well.  All put together the four arrays will have a capacity of 25 MW and save taxpayers $57 million over 20 years.

via Care 2

Comments (6)

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Solar PV
written by Solar PV, December 16, 2011

Wow i am glad to see that correctional facilities are doing this in the US and only wish the UK would do something like this but not sure if it would be a practical solution here but the US can benefit hugely from this as your figures suggest - Renewable energy is certainly the way of the future, would you agree?

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Rehabilitation and Renewable
written by Jim Bailey, December 17, 2011

It would be good if the prisoners are given the training and the skills to maintain the PV system. The cost savings could be increased and people leaving prison are less likely to re-offend if they have skills they can use in the outside world.

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This is not in Illinois
written by Alex Esche, December 17, 2011

I'm pretty sure this isn't in Illinois. I commented on the source but if you look at the jail names and just google Merced County, they're in California. It looks like this isn't happening in IL yet.

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I'm with Jim
written by Fencerdave, December 21, 2011

Novel Idea- correctional facilities what help to correct the problems we have.

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Prisoner power
written by garick, December 24, 2011

Why not force the prisoners to produce power through their own efforts? The mechanical energy from teams of prisoners could be harnessed to provide quite a lot of power. There would be an added benefit in that the prisoners would be be sufficiently tired from power generation duties to make them easier to control.

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Human Hamster Wheels?
written by Fencerdave, January 10, 2012

Because that kind of qualifies as cruel and definitely qualifies as unusual punishment.

I like the concept in theory, but there's something distinctly dystopian about it.

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