Fedco Goes Solar!
With the overwhelming support of our members, we contracted with ReVision Energy of Portland, ME, to install a ground-based
photovoltaic system that, using 176 solar panels, will generate an
estimated 94% of our entire cooperative’s electrical needs. Our
decision to do our part to stop burning fossil fuels is in keeping with
our belief that we all need a stable climate in which to grow our food
and support our agriculture.
When we turned to our members to help us launch our Solar Project we were
overwhelmed by their response. While most such appeals are lucky to generate
a 2% response rate, we were astounded to achieve one of 7.77%! Our members
financed the entire upfront cost of the project, and then some, helping us
to get through our traditional autumn and early winter cash flow ebb without
skipping a beat.
“It’s up to us—up to all of us—to change the world so
every time we look around, we recognize those basic principles of
life…I want to talk about our shared responsibility to leave this
place better than we found it. Not better from a corporate, make-more-money
mode, but a place of beauty, a place that gives us great pleasure throughout
our days and throughout our lives. Because that sense of beauty, of pleasure
in what we are doing each day, is what is going to carry us forward through
the difficult times that we live in now, and the more difficult times that
lie ahead.” –Russell Libby
Solar Panel Update, Fall 2020: Our 54.56 kW solar array
began producing electricity on January 3, 2017. To date it has produced
264.47 MWh of electricity, and we have kept 185 tons of CO2 out
of the atmosphere. Our peak production month to date was July 2019 when we
generated 8.906 MWh. We thank our member donors and lenders
who made this expensive project feasible for us!