A few months ago, a college on Long Island began experimenting with solar carports as a way to not only add solar energy to the power grid but also to power the electric cars beneath. While this plan by the New York Institute of Technology is still in the experimental stage, other parts of Long Island are getting on this solar power craze. One plan is to cover the seven largest parking lots in Suffolk County, Long Island, with solar carports as a way to replace 50 megawatts of the county’s power grid with solar energy. Could Long Island be ahead of everyone in terms of using solar power?
Although we’ve seen solar carports in many other parts of the country, this is the second instance of using solar energy in such a fashion in a relatively small area. In this plan to add solar carports to the seven largest parking lots in Suffolk County, the Long Island Power Authority and enXco, a wind and solar project developer from California, are creating the plan. So far, the areas that will have such carports are various government complexes and Long Island Railroad station lots. These carports will be used only for clean energy to the county power grid – not for powering electric vehicles as of yet.
What makes carports so ideal as a source for clean energy? As you can see from the picture with the article in the link above, the carports are designed much like ordinary metal carports, with peaked roofs and enough space to fit several cars below. As the metal shelter protects the vehicles from the rain and UV ray exposure, the solar panels on top of the carport use the energy from the sun to power the electric grid. While which buildings that will be powered by this clean energy aren’t specified in the article, these seven lots with solar carports will be displacing 50 megawatts of the overall electricity with clean energy.
