Industrial and Commercial Use

4. Sunora Energy Solutions, Martin Luther King Jr. Charter School Solar System

Firm: Sunora Energy Solutions
Project: Martin Luther King Jr. Charter School Solar System
Project Owner: Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Charter School

Using standardization, modularization and preassembly, the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Charter School in New Orleans was able to rapidly deploy a 112kW solar system resulting in lower costs, less safety risk, and minimal disruption to the students and school schedule.

Construction consisted of a 120’x90’x27’ tall High Bay Solar Canopy steel structure over an existing playground and the addition of solar panels to an existing walkway.   Installation was comprised of 320 modularized PV solar panels for the High Bay Structure (40 arrays, containing 8 PV modules each) and 77 P panels installed on the existing walkway roof.  Additional enhancements include, switchgear installation for the solar system, electric fans to cool the students on the hot, humid days, lights to extend the use of the playground into the night, colored panels and prisms that cast a spectrum of color onto the playground to create teaching opportunities about refracted light, new water fountains near the garden that use unconsumed water for irrigation, a solar powered, irrigation system for the outdoor classroom and wetlands gardens, and replacement of sod to the existing 300’x250’ grass playground.

Modularization of the High Bay PV Panels was essential to the completion of this project on a very compressed schedule.  The PV panel modules were installed in less than four days and the entire project was completed in five and half weeks.