NYU Energy Panel

April 2010

Andrew McNamara, CEM, LEED AP

Vice President, New Construction & Renewables
Bright Power Inc.
amcnamara@brightpower.biz
+1.212.803.5868
About Bright Power
 Founded in 2004
 Headquartered in New York City, USA
 Degrees of Staff Include:
 PhD Astrophysics
 MS Chemical Engineering
 MBA
 BS Applied Physics
 BS Environmental Engineering

www.brightpower.biz
 Practice Areas
STRATEGIC CONSULTING RENEWABLE ENERGY
Government, Venture Capital, Photovoltaic (PV), Solar Hot Water,
Industry Solar Cooling
•Policy Incubation and Advisory •Design Consulting & Technical Evaluation
•Due Diligence of Technologies •Performance Modeling
•Education & Training: staff are faculty at New •System Monitoring
York University (NYU) and frequent presenters at •Installation Oversight
industry events. •Consultant to over $1 billion in projects (US,UAE)

NEW BUILDINGS EXISTING BUILDINGS

Commercial, Industrial & Commercial, Industrial &
Apartment Buildings Apartment Buildings
•Green Buildings Design •Benchmarking Energy Performance
•Energy Modeling •Energy Auditing & Modeling
•Sustainability Consultant •Project Oversight
•Green Certification (LEED) •Consultant to over 1200 buildings with energy
•Consultant to over $100 million in current projects budget over $150 million/yr

www.brightpower.biz
 Solar Technology
Solar technology comes in 2 main
forms:

Solar Thermal
 Converts sun’s energy into heat
 Fluid carries energy to load
 Tanks enable storage for use in off peak
times

Solar Electric
 Photovoltaic (PV) technology converts
sun’s energy to electricity
 Storage is optional

Hybrids & other technologies do

exist
www.brightpower.biz
Solar Energy Possibilities

 Solar Electricity
 Photovoltaics
 Concentrating Solar Power (only for power plants)

 Solar Water Heating

 Solar Space Heating

 Solar Cooling

www.brightpower.biz
BIPV Mounting Example
New Housing New York: Via Verde

Rendering: Grimshaw Architects www.brightpower.biz

Rendering: Grimshaw Architects www.brightpower.biz
Via Verde Wall Elevation

Credit: Grimshaw Architects www.brightpower.biz

Via Verde Pergola PV plan

Credit: Grimshaw Architects www.brightpower.biz

A few simple things…
…Can greatly reduce the installed cost of solar
 Conduit, wire, switchgear
 “no-brainer” to be installed as part of the base-building
 Structural steel
 Significant cost, so only install if fairly certain of solar

…Can make the installation of solar possible

 Unshaded area with southern exposure
 Group together vents, fans, HVAC to North

 Locate bulkheads toward the north of the roof

www.brightpower.biz
Solar PV Electrical Specs

Base Building Electrical

components for Solar www.brightpower.biz
Solar Electric Economics in NYC

 Federal Tax Credit / Grant

 30% Installed System Cost
 NYC Property Tax Abatement
 35% Installed System Cost
 Accelerated Depreciation
 6 year schedule
 NYSERDA incentive
 $1.75/Watt -NYC incentives are sort of
 If eligible for all incentives, it like legs of a table, if you
adds up to a very fast return on take one away, the
investment economics may fall apart
-Eligibility for tax incentives
can be tricky
www.brightpower.biz
LEED 2009 (Via Verde is LEED 2.2)
EA Credit 1: Optimize
Energy Performance
1-19 points
Every 2% energy cost savings
(fuel + electric) is another point

EA Credit 2: On Site
Renewable Energy
1-7 points
Every 2% energy cost savings is
another point

www.brightpower.biz
 Thank you!
14

Andrew McNamara, CEM, LEED AP

Vice President, Bright Power, Inc.
11 Hanover Square
15th Floor
New York, NY 10005
+1.212.803.5868 x2002
amcnamara@brightpower.biz
www.brightpower.biz

www.brightpower.biz
 Solar electric/photovoltaic

Electrons in “doped” silicon become Photo:

agitated, creating electricity. www.reuk.co.uk

Solar cells are wired together to

form a solar module.

Solar modules are wired together to

form a power-producing array.

Solar array on Roosevelt

Island. Photo:
www.treehugger.com
“Standard” mountings

Photo: Sun Power

Photo: Ready Solar

Photo: Bright
Power www.brightpower.biz
Inverters (PV only)

 Panels generate DC

 Inverter changes DC into AC

at a conversion factor of
~.8, e.g. 100W DC off the
panels becomes 80W AC.

5000W, 600 Volt DC

Inverter
Photo: Solar Electric Supply Inc.,
SMA Sunny Boy

www.brightpower.biz
 Array capacity
Panels rated from 1 watt
to over 200 watts,
containing up to 50
cells

Too many panels = too

much current &/or too
much voltage. Size of
panel strings limited
by capacities of
inverter.
Photo: blogs.reuters.com
Solar Electric PV saves real energy

 Rules of Thumb
 Each kW installed will yield about 1250 kWh annually
 Worth about $250/year at $0.20 per kWh

 Each kW of panels will take up about 100ft2 of roof space.

 1000 ft2 of roof = about 10kW

 Without incentives, “typical” installed cost for an NYC building

is $12,000 per installed kW
 Incentives can cover most/all of the cost of installing a system

www.brightpower.biz
For example…
 A 50 kW PV system would…
 yield 62,500 kWh/year (1250 kWh/kW x 50 kW)
 $12,500 in energy savings per year (at $0.20 per kWh)
 require roughly 5,000 SF unshaded
 cost $600,000 installed before incentives
 Incentives could cover most/all costs

www.brightpower.biz
 Design Considerations, PV and
Thermal

 Tilt angle
 Tracking vs. Fixed
 Orientation (azimuth)
 Due South
 Thermal collectors: SRCC
Certification
 PV modules: UL Listed
Source: Silicon Solar
Photo

www.brightpower.biz