Community Solar Brings Clean Energy Home

With more than 300 days of sunshine a year, and maybe even more considering the mildness of this past winter, it’s easy to understand why members’ interest in solar energy is growing. South Central Texas is proving to be a good location for producing this type of renewable energy, and is an important reason we began selling solar systems through GVEC Home several years ago. Another reason was to ensure that members who are interested in purchasing a system would be able to get reliable information from a trusted source.

We realize, however, that investing in a home solar system isn’t for everyone, even though they may be intrigued by the idea of green energy and all that it represents. With this in mind, GVEC searched for an alternative solar solution and found one I believe will be beneficial to all. We recently executed a contract with AEP Onsite LLC for the construction of a two-megawatt community solar project that should be completed this coming fall. It will be located on approximately 16 acres off of Highway 90A, between Seguin and Gonzales.

If you’re not familiar with the term, “community solar,” it refers to a shared, renewable energy plant located within the local community and connected to the local electric grid.

The benefit of this project to GVEC members is twofold. They will have the opportunity to purchase local, renewable energy at affordable prices without having to invest in or put a solar system on their own home.  Additionally, having energy consumed at the distribution voltage level of GVEC’s electric grid will help save money for all GVEC members in transmission costs, which are administered by the  Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT).

This is a very exciting project for the Co-op and is something we can all take pride in. It represents clean, renewable and affordable energy from an energy source right here in our own backyard. We’ll keep you informed as the project progresses, including how you can sign up and the pricing structure.  Once everything is in place, we believe we will be able to offer our members solar energy at competitive rates.