By Lea Kahn
The sun already had set Tuesday evening, but that did not take away from the sunny mood inside the Lawrence High School Commons as school district officials celebrated the sale of $1 million’s worth of solar energy credits in one year’s time.
The owners of solar energy systems may “sell” the energy generated by the panels to utility companies, known as solar renewable energy credits. The Lawrence Township public school district has sold $1 million in SRECs over the past year and that’s why school district officials were celebrating.
Most of the $1 million is being used to pay this year’s portion of the debt service for the solar referendum. The remaining $354,000 is being put toward the proposed 2011-12 budget.
Philip Meara, superintendent of schools, outlined the history of the solar energy initiative and also awarded the district’s Cardinal Wing Award which is given out sparingly to several people who helped shepherd the project along.
School district officials began exploring the possibility of installing solar panels on each of the seven school buildings in 2004, Mr. Meara said. The goal was to address the loss of revenue as a result of Robbinsville Township’s decision to build its own high school, ending the sending-receiving relationship between the Lawrence and Robbinsville school districts.
”With a constant eye towards savings and efficiency, initial investigations revealed that the project was viable,” Mr. Meara said.
But first, some of the roofs had to be replaced. Voters approved a referendum in December 2006 to provide money to replace the roofs, which would be designed to accept solar panels, he said.
After confirming the solar panel initiative was viable, the school board agreed to put the issue to a vote at the annual school board election in April 2008, Mr. Meara said. Voters were asked to approve a $10.5 million bond referendum to install solar energy panels on school building roofs.
Preparing for the referendum, Mr. Meara and Thomas Eldridge, district business administrator, met with community groups and the schools’ parent-teacher organization. They told the groups the solar project would avoid more than 10,000 tons of CO2 emissions, reduce the dependency on foreign oil and be the equivalent of planting 3,000 trees.
”As a result of a financial analysis prior to the referendum, we told anyone who would listen that we could produce energy, which could then be sold as solar renewable energy credits at $280 each,” he said.
Voters were convinced and approved the solar referendum by 70 percent.
”That brings us to tonight’s celebration,” Mr. Meara said. “A project like this only happens because of the foresight of some gifted individuals who have the uncanny ability to envision the future of LTPS. These people donate many hours of their time to make our dreams the reality that we all know as the Lawrence Township public schools.”
Mr. Meara said he would like to recognize those individuals by presenting them with the Cardinal Wing Award. The award is shaped in the form of a cardinal’s wing because the cardinal is the school district’s mascot. The wings also describe what these individuals do for the school district they enable flight, influence direction, promote stability and provide protection, he said.
The first Cardinal Wing Award of the evening was presented to state Sen. Shirley K. Turner, D-15, who lives in Lawrence. She arranged for the school district to receive $2.3 million in transition aid over several years while the school district worked out how it would deal with the loss of revenue from Robbinsville students, Mr. Meara said.
”At the time, Sen. Turner wrote that it was her hope that we use this money to provide tax relief and save jobs,” he said. “It also helped us to understand that our community could no longer shoulder the growing financial burden of our school system.
”This realization led our school board to design a project, which would contribute not just ecologically, but also financially year after year. It was our solar referendum. That angel who came forth to rescue our district from the financial impact (of losing Robbinsville) is our Sen. Shirley Turner.”
Mr. Eldridge presented the next set of Cardinal Wing Awards to school board members Ginny Bigley, Michael Brindle, Debbie Endo, Leon Kaplan, Bill Michalson, Thomas Patrick and Laura Waters, who were serving on the board at the time of the 2008 solar referendum. They still are serving on the board.
Mr. Eldridge said the board undertook a “very risky endeavor” by favoring the solar energy initiative, but in order to “get something you’ve never had, you have to do something you’ve never done.”
The board saw troubled times were coming, he said, and it took action.
Then Mr. Eldridge presented an oversized check for $1 million to the board that represented the amount of money earned through the sale of solar renewable energy credits in the year the solar panels have been working.
”They said it couldn’t be done. It’s been done,” he said.
Mr. Eldridge also presented a Cardinal Wing Award to Bouldin Hitchcock, the district’s director of facilities. Mr. Hitchcock knows the facilities and also has an analytical mind, he said, adding the facilities director made certain what was written on paper came to life on the school buildings.
Finally, Mr. Meara presented a Cardinal Wing Award to Mr. Eldridge. Acknowledging the business administrator, he noted, “Superintendents and school board members come and go, but one fiscally conservative voice has been heard throughout this seven-year process.”
”His encyclopedic knowledge has made sure that we have dotted every ‘I’ and crossed every ‘T,’ but even with all his skills, he does make mistakes. He told us that our solar installations would produce 1.2 megawatts of power, but today it is actually producing 1.5 megawatts,” Mr. Meara said, gently teasing Mr. Eldridge.
The business administrator also said the solar installations would meet 23 percent of the district’s energy needs, but it’s actually meeting 27 percent of those needs, Mr. Meara said. The SRECs were supposed to sell for $280 apiece, but when the most recent set of SRECs were sold earlier this month, they fetched $655 apiece.
”That’s how we have made over $1 million in one year and that’s why we are celebrating tonight,” Mr. Meara said. “So, as smart as he is, these are mistakes that we all can accept and embrace.”

