VIDEO: Documentary on University Park Solar Energy Project Debuts

A documentary featuring the story of how the University Park Church of the Brethren got a solar panel roof debuted Saturday night for residents and will now be available online on YouTube.

About 40 people attended a viewing of the  documentary Saturday evening at the Church of the Brethren. The documentary was produced by sophomore Daniel Silversmith, a major in electro-engineering at the University of Maryland. Ross Salawitch, a professor of atmospheric science at the University of Maryland and a member of the advisory committee for STEP UP, initially suggested that the project should be documented.

University Park Community Solar LLC, a company consisting of about 35 investors, contributed $130,000 to pay for the installation of the panels on the church in May.

"A couple of years ago people in the community started talking about promoting the use of solar energy," explained Hooker Monroe, a resident of University Park and member of both the Church of the Brethren and University Park Community Solar. "We started thinking about different ways to do that and what evolved was an idea of a small investment group, a small company, which became University Park Solar."

The group purchased a 22 kilowatt array of solar panels. The church serves as host site and it buys its energy from University Park Solar.

"The company has become the church's energy provider," continued Monroe.  "The church gets the energy at a slightly lower rate than it would from PEPCO."

Meanwhile, the investors of University Park Solar get a quicker return on their investment because they received a grant from the U.S. Department of Energy, other federal incentives and green energy credits.

"So the church gets energy a little cheaper, the members of University Park Solar get a little bit back from their investment over a few years. It's a win-win situation for all," added Monroe.

Monroe noted that the church saves about 2 cents per kilowatt hour.

"Those aren't huge numbers," he said. "But what we are more motivated by is the idea that the energy we use comes from a totally clean source," he said.

He added that since the system went active on June 22, the equivalent of three tons of carbon dioxide has been saved.

President of UPCSLLC David Brosch has been regarded as the man behind the project. An energy auditor, Brosch came up with the idea of developing a community energy company when he was asked to audit a project in Mt. Pleasant, Washington about three years ago. He was impressed by the coop formed by residents of Mt. Pleasant and thought that something similar could be done in University Park.

Upon his return from Washington State Brosch started organizing citizens of University Park to start discussing the idea.

"We talked about the concept and then formed a committee to work on the formation of a company," he said. The whole process took about two years.

Although the plan was to seek investors to finance a project, Brosch explained that he didn't want to approach investors until things were set up. This would include an agreement with a company to supply the panels and install them, an operating agreement with owners of a building, the creation of by laws and more.

"We discussed the idea of having someone document the things going up," Salawitch said.

Salawitch sent e-mails to the members of the atmospheric science department at the University of Maryland to see if anyone had video cameras that could be used to film the installation of the panels. He also had a number of still cameras that were ultimately used as well. Video cameras were found and colleagues set up two cameras at the site which photographed the work in time lapse photography.

In addition, people involved with the project were interviewed on audio tape and videos of others giving speeches about the project were also provided.

"We wanted to tell our story in a way that was compelling, entertaining and educational," concluded Salawitch.
All of the material was given to Silversmith who put the documentary together. He had no experience in film production when he started the project.

"I did a lot of googling to find out how to do it and I performed and then repeated the process until we got what we wanted," he said.

The 8-minute documentary can be viewed on YouTube.

UPCSLLC hopes to continue their efforts in town and also place a solar panel on the roof of University Park Elementary School.