Catherine Nelson, Commissioner, Town of Newfields

Maggie Hassan, U.S. Senator

Martha Fuller Clark, State Senator

Bill Behrens, Co-Founder, ReVision Energy

2. Ribbon Cutting

3. Solar Array Tour 

• Ribbon cutting in front of ground-mounted solar array
• Newfields Elementary school students (weather permitting)

U.S. Senator Maggie Hassan will join officials from The Town of Newfields to unveil a 216-panel solar array during a ribbon cutting ceremony on February 8. The 75.6-kilowatt, ground-mounted array is located at the town’s wastewater treatment plant and was installed by ReVision Energy at no upfront cost to the municipality.

“The Newfields Village Water and Sewer District is excited about the opportunity to benefit from solar energy at our facility,” said district Commissioner Catherine Nelson. “It is our hope to serve as a leader in the clean energy movement as a result of lowering our town’s carbon footprint and in turn lowering northern New England’s reliance on fossil fuels.”

ReVision Energy owns the system and sells the electricity to the town through a Power Purchase Agreement (PPA). The array is expected to save taxpayers roughly $530,000 over the life of the system if the town agrees to a purchase option that becomes available in year seven of the agreement. The PPA gives the municipality the ability to leverage the economic and environmental benefits of solar power while allowing ReVision Energy the opportunity to make community investments that align with its core values of creating positive change in the world.

A PPA is an innovative financing tool that allows the municipality to benefit from solar power on a cashflow-positive basis from day one. Under the agreement, the Town of Newfields agrees to purchase electricity from ReVision Energy at a fixed rate schedule, which is currently below the town’s cost to purchase grid electricity. In the seventh year of the agreement, the municipality will have the option to purchase the system at a significant discount, enabling the town to generate free solar power for decades to come.

Water and wastewater treatment plants often represent the largest electricity users in a given municipality and, therefore, provide the greatest opportunity for energy savings. These facilities are ideal locations for solar energy systems due to the availability of rooftops or open land and the existence of robust electrical equipment that can support large-scale solar electric systems without expensive utility upgrades.

The solar array has a useful lifespan of 40 years and is expected to generate nearly 100% of the wastewater treatment plant’s electric load. The array will produce approximately roughly 93,000-kilowatt hours of clean energy each year, which is equivalent to offsetting nearly 98,000 pounds of carbon pollution or the emissions from 5,000 gallons of gas.