The 100 year-old retirement community, Masonic Village at Elizabethtown, in Pennsylvania, is up to new tricks with a 1.2 megawatt photovoltaic installation. The array will likely start providing power for the community in February.

The community is large, spanning 1,400 acres, including forest and farmlands, said Masonic Village CEO Joseph Murphy. The environment has been an important consideration for Masonic Village, and the non-profit organization has been working to reduce its carbon footprint for a while.

“We thought it [i.e. solar] was good fit for us,” he said.

Installation on the array began Dec. 20, 2010.

“The ground-mounted array is on 5 acres on a sloped field we did farming at,” Murphy said. “It sits right in the middle of our campus.”

The first 200-kilowatt phase is expected to start producing power in mid-February and the remaining 800 kW should be producing by mid-April.

Masonic Village will use all the power provided by the array, according to Murphy. It will provide about 5 percent of the campus’ needs and will be tied into the system directly.

“We bring the electric in from PP&L and then have a high voltage electric distribution system on our campus,” he said. “We’re connecting [the array] right in to our system.”

According to Murphy, the solar energy will lead to significant energy savings.

“We anticipate between $40,000 and $60,000 annually,” he said.

Masonic Village will purchase the power provided by the system from Elizabethtown Solar Electric Partners, LLC, under a power-purchase agreement. Murphy said he thought the contract was for 20 years, with an option to purchase the system outright in year six or seven of the contract. The company is installing and financing the $4.5 million project, Murphy said.

Elizabethtown Solar will receive $1 million in state grants for the installation, helping to reduce the cost of the power.

Murphy explained that the grants were one of the reasons that made the project possible.

“It is an area that made solar more viable,” he said. “The technology keeps getting better and cheaper. There are a couple of matrix changes that could make this very viable in the near future.”

Looking forward, Murphy said Masonic Village may consider adding more solar at the site.

“We have capacity here on this campus,” he said.

The community may expand in the future if the project is successful. Masonic Village also may put solar in at other sites.

Image courtesy of Masonic Village at Elizabethtown.