In This Florida Community, You Don’t Pay for Electricity

In this Florida urbanizationnobody pays electricity bill,

This is not because of subsidies, but because of the design: all 86 houses are built or planned. hunter pointA urbanization an hour south of tamparely 14 solar panels And a domestic battery Of 12 kilowatts per hour in the utility closet.

One afternoon, solar panels three storey house William and Suanne Fulford produce double energy What they consume. they use part of standby power To charge the battery, which feed your house during the night, and sell the rest electrical network, in his previous house Virginia Beachthe couple came to pay Bill Electricity up to $600 per month.

“We have not received any invoice yet,” he says. WilliamA retired contractor 76-year-old man who built custom homes for decades before moving on Florida, “If I built another house again, it would be this solar energy, “It makes a big difference.”

hunter point It is the first urbanization in the world to achieve LEED Zero Energy Certificationaccording to him United States Green Building Council, which means that the entire community produces more electricity than it consumes. of this style Construction Presents a building model Sustainable in times of climate changeAccording to Avery McEvoyWho investigates carbon free electricity Rocky Mountain InstituteA clean energy think tank.

“When you build a home or community, you are investing in your generation as well as future generations,” he said. ,The more we plan for the future in an integrated and sustainable way“The more resilient our communities will be.”

In addition to reducing carbon emission He heat the planetSolar panels and home batteries hunter point They reduce the chance of losing power in the event of a storm. When hurricane ian strike southwest Florida Millions more were left without power in 2022 – including homeowners across the street. hunter point-, the light of Fulford They remained.

“I feel very safe here,” he says. William, “Here we have already gone through a hurricane…And this neighborhood was not left without electricity, so it had no impact on us.”

Patience It’s important for this neighborhood coastal Because hunter point is located in a lower peninsulabounded by Channelwhich tells deeply Sarasota Bay, This protects gulf of mexicostorm-prone, near a narrow island barrier Less than 305 meters wide at its nearest point.

Pearl HomesHe Florida Promoter Who is behind this project? hunter point A lower central park was built one and a half meters above the existing ground level, allowing water to drain away road After the flood. Each house is built over a garage on the first floor, so that all rooms are at least five meters above sea level. Walls are designed to resist Winds at a speed of 241 kilometers per hour,

But marshal gobutifounder of Pearl Homessays that a solar panel And a Battery They are just as important as high roads and strong walls to ensure that people can return to their homes after a major storm. “If you can get home, great. If your house is still standing, even better,” he says. “But if you don’t have electricity, you can’t stay in your home.”

In addition to keeping their own lights on during a storm, communities prefer hunter point They can make the electrical grid even more resistant For your neighbors.

power companies could pay owners for using part of Capacity From their home batteries to balance the grid. When there is a lot of electricity on the grid and demand for electricity is low, the power company charges batteries Of participating owners. Then, when power demand peaks, the company can draw power. energy from the batteries and return it to the grid to meet demand.

This concept is called virtual power plant And there are more than 500 projects of this type United States and CanadaAccording to the Energy and Resources Consultancy’s February 2023 report wood mackenzie, Virtual power plants can help power companies To meet the peaks of demand without the need to resort to thermal power plants operated by fossil fuel,

“With a virtual power plant, you help the community and the local grid,” he says. McEvoy, “It’s the other kind recovery capability, You can provide these services to your local system, charge for it, and keep the network online.” “By the time we complete our last home in 2025, the goal is virtual power plant“, he says gobuti,

a spokesperson for Florida Power and Light It declined to say whether talks were ongoing with the utility. hunter point about the idea, but said they would face obstacles Florida Public Service CommissionWhich controls the large utility companies in the state.

Asked about it, cindy muirone who directs Consumer Assistance and Disclosure Office “We are not familiar with the term ‘term’,” the commission said in an email.virtual power plant, And so, we don’t have standards that define that term.”

First Pearl Homes will begin construction of hunter point In June 2022, it built one of the first LEED Zero Energy Home in the world, inside a warehouse located 18 kilometers away Palmetto, Florida,

Two-storey houses – models of houses that are for sale now hunter point Between 1.35 and 1.8 million dollars – was equipped with a system of Air Conditioning, home appliancestwo televisions, one domestic battery and a set of solar panels (Installed on the roof of the warehouse, where they could catch the sun). up to 18 months, Pearl Homes Collected data on what appliances were used and how much, just like a typical homeowner Electricity consumed and how much its solar panels produced.

“There was one guy whose full-time job was to run equipment,” he explains. gobuti, “We ran the shower. We used to light the stove every day. “We also had a Peloton bike.”

In 18 months developers demonstrated that model homes produced more energy Comparing consumption, they found that 22 owners who have moved in so far actually consume 25% less energy than expected, and its solar panels produce 35% more energy than expected.

To run the houses well, Pearl Homes equipped them efficient equipment15 centimeters insulation foam on the walls and double glazed windows, The developer spent $88,000 on the panels. Solar and efficiency improvements For every house. owners can claim 35% of the federal tax credit (approximately $30,000) when filing your income tax return in the first year after the transfer.

gobuti He hopes a national builder will copy his company’s designs, which could change the way Americans live across the country. He said, “There’s someone out there who’s going to do that.”

(c) 2024, The Washington Post