And it comes with fantastic views of downtown Kansas City
Solar energy is more popular than ever before with more people and businesses going to their local solar company to help them get more green. Of course, we 100% agree with this and wanted to set a good example. So, on a recent June Saturday morning, a smallish volunteer group of Brightergy employees trekked into the office in the name of building something: a solar energy installation of our own.
All of us here are proud of the fact that over the past several years, we’ve been able to work with more than 600 clients and complete more than 1200 energy projects. But none of those projects were on our own office building.
Leasing space at 1617 Main St. in Kansas City’s Crossroads district meant we were shaded by a taller building directly to the south of us, completely ruling out any opportunity for a solar array. But when we made the move across the street to 1712 Main this past winter, we also made plans for our new, larger offices to be outfitted with energy-efficient LED lighting, and to install solar panels on the roof of our building.
Many offices are going down the same route, with older buildings in need of complete renovation to get up to standard. This can often be a huge job, with things like windows and heating needing replacing to reduce energy consumption. Modern offices tend to use greywater to flush toilets too, which may require a lot of retrofitting for an older building relying on mains water. Multi-M Contracting and similar contractors are used to fitting out buildings like this though, helping companies achieve much lower energy consumption.
On Saturday, our project finally came to fruition. Led by some of our experienced Project Managers, Installers, and Quality/Safety Assurance, employees from IT to Legal helped lift materials to the roof, set racking and panels in place, securing everything to complete the array. It might have been easier if we had tried replacing elevator sheaves with newer ones to ensure high weight capacity for such loads, but nevertheless, we managed to get it done. This week, our experienced electricians are wiring the panels together, which will enable us to submit an Interconnection Request to our utility, KCP&L, for our 6.72-kilowatt solar-power system. If you are thinking of having something like this installed in your area, you may want to look into electricians that can do this for you, for example, you may want to look for a point cook electrician if that is where you are based, otherwise, you can look up a local electrician to discuss with you your options.
This is a case of pictures speaking more than words, but as you go through our slideshow, you’ll not only see the project come together, but you’ll also witness the incredible views we have of downtown Kansas City, the Kauffman Performing Arts Center, and the Crossroads.
And then there’s one of our favorite parts about being in this building: from just about every angle, you can look down onto the rooftops of KC and see our handiwork, on clients’ buildings like Helix Architecture, SCD Probiotics, OfficePortKC, Mpress, and more.
For a company whose work is often invisible from the street, or to the average building inhabitant, it’s pretty rewarding to be able to look down on our incredible, growing city and see the work we’ve built together.
Update: Want to see even more photos? Check out our extended album on our Facebook page.