Solar power gives Gatorade facility energy boost

Gatorade is known for giving athletes an energy boost, but now it's giving itself an infusion of power.

The Gatorade facility in Tolleson, one of the largest in the country in terms of gallons produced, is generating some of its own electricity from newly installed solar panels on its roof.

The facility has two buildings connected by a bridge over 104th Avenue - one side is a manufacturing plant; the other, a distribution center.

SPG Solar installed a 500-kilowatt system occupying more than an acre and a half on the roof of the distribution center, which allows Gatorade to cut its power usage from SRP by 40 percent on the warehouse building.

This makes Gatorade the largest customer-owned solar-energy project in Arizona, and it's already generating more energy than anticipated. It's expected to produce more than 783,000 kilowatt hours a year, or enough to power about 51 Valley households.

"We know immediately what our output is and what our performance is," said Curt Mills, regional operations manager for PepsiCo, Gatorade's parent company.

They track the data through SRP's Web site and partnered with the utility company on the solar project. SRP gave it a $1.2 million incentive through the EarthWise Solar Incentive Program, and it received $25,000 from a state credit and 30 percent of the total cost - which Mills declined to disclose for competitive reasons - from federal credits.

"To make the project viable, we needed the credits," Mills said.

The project will save the company about $51,000 a year in energy costs and, with incentives, has just under a four-year payback.

It also will offset about 392 metric tons of carbon dioxide a year. Installation began in June and was finished in November.

If he had to give advice to other large companies, Mills would recommend installing the panels in cooler months. Workers had to start by 3 a.m. and only could work until 8 or 9 a.m.

Gatorade wanted to be able to use all the tax credits by the end of 2008 because it wasn't clear if the federal government would extend them, but it did so through 2016. Residential credits, in fact, were greatly expanded.

Arizona residents commonly question why they can't tap more solar power. But because electricity here is so comparatively inexpensive, it hasn't been economically feasible for most customers. About 20 commercial customers participate in the EarthWise Solar program, said Chico Hunter, an engineer in SRP's sustainability initiatives and technologies, and seven of those have systems of 20 kilowatts or larger.

"The reality is, even with the federal tax credits and state tax credits and SRP incentives," he said, "it's still very expensive and it's a big investment for companies to make."

In addition, the Gatorade distribution center's roof was strong enough to hold solar panels. Customers with older or less sturdy facilities might incur extra costs to reinforce or replace roofs before installing solar-eneregy systems.