Boonville hotel embracing solar panels

As the weather warms up, the Boonville area is getting a little greener. Flowers are blooming, trees are budding and it’s time to mow the grass again.

The Hotel Frederick, 501 High St., in Boonville, Mo., is getting a bit greener, too.

The downtown Boonville hotel has begun installation of solar panels designed to put less pressure on the environment and to take advantage of the bright Missouri sun.

Hotel Frederick owner Bill Haw, Jr. is also assisting in the development of the Telegram Building, a historic property located in Kansas City’s Stockyards District.

“This is our second project,” said Haw of the solar panel project at Hotel Frederick. “Our first project was in Kansas City, at the Telegram Building.”
The progress that has been made with the solar panels there inspired Haw to install them in Boonville, he said.

“Now’s a great time to do something that was good for the environment and worked for us financially,” said Haw.

The installers of the panels, Brightergy Energy Solutions, has been imperative in the process, he said.

“We had a fantastic experience on the first (installation),” said Haw. “Everything went very smooth.”

Brightergy, which is headquartered in Kansas City with offices in St. Louis and Boston, has been brightening up buildings all over, from the city of Florrissant, Mo. to Rockhurst High School in Kansas City.

But then there’s the other important “green” — the kind you find in your wallet. The project needed to be financially sound before installing the solar panels, said Haw.

According to Haw, in 2011, there was funding available from both federal sources and locally from Ameren, and dipping into those coffers made the plan work out for the hotel.

Local law firm Conway and Blanck took advantage of these credits when they installed solar panels atop their office in August 2011 at their 213 Main St. location, near the hotel. Previous Boonville Daily News reports notes a $150 per month savings from the panels.

The solar power generated on the roof of the Hotel Frederick will feed directly into the building’s power, said Haw, rather than being stored in a battery. That means if the hotel is using a lot of power on a sunny day, electrical costs will be lower.

Better yet, said Haw, “when you’re not consuming (power), it runs the meter backwards,” which pumps electricity back into the grid. That electricity can earn the customer full retail credit for this electricity on their bill, according to the Missouri Easy Connection Act, passed in 2007.

With those savings, the system should pay for itself in about five years, he said.

Haw said the project has generated a fantastic amount of praise on Facebook, and may be a draw for the hotel, citing its green amenities. In years past, the hotel has moved towards an environmentally friendly experience, including aluminum recycling, bulk soaps and water conservation.

“This is part of something bigger that’s going on,” said Haw. “We’re excited too.”