RPCS partnered with GenPro Energy Solutions and the City of Atkinson to build a 209-kW solar array in Nebraska on a particularly challenging site. The city formerly used the Atkinson-owned site for fill, a place where soil, trees, and debris were brought then covered with dirt. This created embedment depths up to 30 feet — three times the norm — which would need longer than normal I-beams that would add significant costs for construction and material. Moreover, loose soil and debris could cause refusal of the post for a regular piledriver.
The City of Atkinson also wanted a tracked system that could provide enough energy to offset the energy consumption of their Water Treatment Plant. Through NPPD’s Buy-Sell Solar Rider, Atkinson can create long-term cash flow for the city through the production of solar energy.
Project developer GenPro Energy Solutions, which specializes in municipal solar development throughout the Midwest, brings design and custom energy solution integration expertise to the project while RPCS helped drive a creative solution to a complex engineering issue.
The solution was to use the DuraTrack HZ v3 single-axis solar tracker by Array Technologies, supplied by RPCS. Array’s mounting technology ensured up to a 20 to 25 percent increase in energy production over fixed-tilt systems. RPCS designs and installs Array tracker systems throughout the country, with hundreds of projects completed to date in the utility and distributed generation markets.
To overcome the embedment issue, the project features TerraSmart‘s ground screw foundation posts, a seamless solution to the challenging nature of the site’s subsurface conditions. TerraSmart and Array solar trackers were integrated for the first time on this project, a partnership forged with the help of RPCS. TerraSmart’s ground screws have a better ability to resist uplift than I-beams in loose soil and can drill into debris, reducing upfront construction costs and eliminating subsurface risks.
“This project is a great example of how teamwork, engineering, and innovative solutions can help overcome site challenges and result in the most efficient design for all parties involved. GenPro’s value engineering, Array’s superior grade tolerance, and TerraSmart’s unique foundation posts all allowed for a system that will maximize power production for the City of Atkinson,” says RPCS Sales Director Dylan Wraga. “There were underground challenges that TerraSmart’s solution was well suited to, and combined with Array’s reliable architecture this system will be producing clean power for many years to come.”
— Solar Builder magazine
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