Metropolitan Community College (MCC) will be commissioning a solar hot water system in the Horticulture Department's Fort Omaha Campus greenhouse on April 1, 2011. This is the first solar installation of its kind in the state and the first in any community college across the country. The purpose of the solar system is to assist with heating the greenhouse during the winter and to provide heat for bedding plant growing tables.The funding for the solar installation was provided by a grant from the Nebraska Energy Office.
The greenhouse was selected as a demonstration site because it provided multiple types of different heating uses and can show an energy cost savings. The technology of the solar demonstration system is readily transferable to greenhouses and hot houses across the state for bedding plants and vegetable crops, thereby impacting the economies of rural Nebraska.
Students will have access to the system for installation seminars as they disassemble and re-assemble various components of the system.The Nebraska Solar Energy Society will hold their bi-monthly meeting at the Fort Omaha Campus and provide a speaker at the buffet following the commissioning tour of the solar system. The Nebraska Solar Energy Society is a group supporting the expansion of solar technology with public education programs.For more information about the solar tour, contactMichael Shonka, Project Coordinator for Sustainable Energy Technology, at mshonka1@mccneb.edu or(402) 738-4536.
The solar tour of the greenhouse begins at 6 p.m. The tour is free. The buffet dinner follows at 7 p.m. The cost of the of the dinner is $15. RSVPs are requested at focuseg@cox.net or call Gary Boe (402) 321-2797.
Campus map link is below. Meet at Greenhouse, Bldg 27. Dinner at Bldg 21. http://www.mccneb.edu/campuslocations/maps/Fort%20Omaha%20Campus%20Map.pdf
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