The Banyoles City Council will create the municipality’s first energy community in the Darder museum, where 74 photovoltaic panels will be installed.
The council anticipates that this installation will generate 36,082 kilowatt hours per year and the council plans to award the works in the coming weeks. A third of all the energy produced by the photovoltaic panels will be used to supply the museum.
The remaining two-thirds will be distributed to around twenty families in vulnerable situations or suffering from energy poverty, who will have to join the energy community.
The project will cost about 80,000 euros. In the event that there is excess energy, the community will be opened to other residents of Banyoles who are not in a vulnerable situation.
The mayor of Banyoles, Miquel Noguer, has announced that the project is already very advanced and that the installation of the solar panels that will be in the Darder museum remains to be awarded. These are 74 plates of 31 kilowatts peak and will have a peak power of 415 watts peak.
The initial efficiency will be 21.4% and the performance will be 87.4% after 30 years. In addition, two inverters with an efficiency of 98% and a new connection will be installed that will allow all energy production to be fed into the electrical grid.
Of all the energy generated by the photovoltaic field, a third will be for the consumption of the Darder museum itself. The remaining two-thirds will go to around twenty vulnerable families or those suffering from energy poverty.
Noguer recalled that there were other facilities with a larger roof extension to install solar panels, but that they have chosen to place them close to where families who are in a vulnerable situation live. “We could have gone to the Farga pavilion, but the homes are further away,” added the mayor.
For this reason, the mayor recalls that “the essence” of the energy community is to supply people in the radius closest to the area where the energy is produced to avoid losses of electrical flow along the way.
Miquel Noguer has announced that they will begin a “first test” and analyze the functioning of this community. From there they will decide how to evolve the project.
What they have highlighted is that in the event that there are not enough vulnerable families interested in participating in the community, they will open it to the entire population.
The project will cost around 80,000 euros and has a subsidy from the Girona Provincial Council of around 40,000 euros. It is expected that the energy community will contribute emissions savings of 9,000 kilos of CO2 per year.