The visual arts building is undergoing upgrades to its solar panel water heating system. For the last three years the Art Department was unable to fund the upgrades for the Solar system to be renovated, but now after consulting a solar panel system expert from Colorado, the Visual Arts building will operating under a state of the art solar system come Christmas time.
“The reason we are so excited about this is because the people at the Art College have been so supportive,” Director of Operations John Davis said.
Senior Art Major Katelyn Florence said, “I think it’s pretty cool that they’re finally upgrading. It seems like the arts at any college is usually last building or department people think about to give funding to.”
Additional storage capacity for hot water; roof-top piping alterations to better allow for expansion and contraction; a New Solar Pump System dedicated to the solar system for better isolation/control between campus heating and Solar heating; a new Heat Rejection fan unit to prevent overheating and better designed for expansion/contraction are all modifications that are currently under way.
“We couldn’t get the funding because we had to get somethings done that were more detrimental to the building,” Davis said.
One of the previous issues with the solar system was that it made the mechanical rooms to hot, and consequently, some classrooms. The Coordinator of the Sculpture Area, Ashely Carlisle, works close to the mechanical rooms. Carlisle declined to comment about how the new system will affect the building.
How the upgrades will work: The heat from the sun, primarily in the hours of 11:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m., will heat the water in the tubes located on the roof and then stored in the tanks. Throughout the night the tanks heat the building, and come morning, are ready to be reheated by the sun. Effectively, the solar system and tanks are like a battery, charging during the day to be used at night.
“The building occupants should not notice, although we know they will be warmer this winter due to other building alterations performed this last summer, but the Solar will be able to satisfy a larger portion of the building’s heating requirements and should be able to handle all of the domestic hot water demand,” Davis said. “Now we will have measurements to determine how well the Solar system is performing and these numbers will be displayed in the Visual Arts Building.”
Freshman Art Major Jessica Brennan said, “At least now the solar panels will be more than an expensive decoration on the roof.”
John Davis and the UW operations team are hopeful that the project will be in full working order at Christmas time. It’ll be sort of a Christmas present to the arts building and to me, Davis said. If the upgrades cannot be completed on schedule, the solar panels should be operational by the New Year.
