Oregon Transportation Facilities Offset Energy Use with SolarWorld Solar Panels

Planners of Oregon's transportation infrastructure are charting a course to a cleaner energy future by using SolarWorld solar panels to support their multi-modal services.

With unobstructed rights-of-way and heavy energy use, transportation agencies are suitable hosts for photovoltaic (PV) systems and consumers of the renewable electricity they produce. SolarWorld's high-performance solar panels power highway, rail and airport installations in Oregon.

Transportation industry officials in 13 countries and 27 states have requested information on a large solar park built on Oregon Department of Transportation (ODOT) property at the Baldock Rest Area on Interstate 5 near Wilsonville. The project went online in January 2012 and will be open to the public in the spring with an interpretive display and a sustainable community garden. The 1.75-megawatt (MW) system, known as the Baldock Solar Highway project, is operated by Portland General Electric (PGE). The Baldock installation sits atop 7 acres (~3 hectares) of formerly unused ODOT property and is composed of 6,994 SolarWorld solar panels.

Common in Europe, solar installations in highway rights-of-way were virtually unknown in this country before ODOT and PGE developed a roadside Oregon Solar Highway pilot project to help light the way for drivers at the interchange of Interstates 5 and 205 in Tualatin, north of Baldock, in 2008.

TriMet, Portland's regional public transit agency, will commission a 60-kilowatt (kW) solar installation featuring SolarWorld solar panels at the South Terminus of the MAX green and yellow light-rail lines near Portland State University in late February 2012. The system, installed by REC Solar, is the agency's first large-scale PV installation. In addition to generating more than 64,000 kilowatt-hours (kWh) of solar energy each year and helping to shield TriMet from rising utility rates, the graceful, curvilinear design of the installation has been hailed as public art by some local transit observers.

Portland International Airport is also home to a solar system featuring 120 SolarWorld solar panels. The 28kW ground-mount system, commissioned in December 2011, helps power a treatment facility for the airport's newly expanded de-icing storm-water collection system. The facility treats runoff containing the de-icing chemicals used on the airfield and aircraft to enhance flight safety when the weather turns cold. A Blue Sky renewable energy grant from Pacific Power helped cover the installation cost.