Kaiser hospital has built a green building in North Vacaville, they have nearly finished it, and yet again this year they have delayed the opening until next year. Bad economy is not helping it, but we still like seeing our new hospital because we know they must someday open it, because there it is.
Last month, November 2008, they did open up some of the medical specialty offices in the new hospital. This place is built green and it is green. SCIF, State Compensation Insurance just opened up a new, large office complex of buildings, put the solar panels up over the parking lot, shading the employees' cars, this will serve as a nice surprise in the summer when the employees get into their cars after working all day and the car is not so hot in the summer sun.
Located in Vacaville California, one of the greenest spots in America in the right winter months, the beautiful hills that surround Vacaville are gently rolling green hills, the rest of the year they are the golden hills.
Vacaville is fast becoming the green and solar capital of the United States as it boasts many solar power stations installed at several local companies most recently including Mariani Fruit which is one of the original Vacaville mainstays in the days when Vacaville first became a settlement for the modern inhabitants of the 1800s when Juan Vaca and Juan Pena first brought their families here to live, relocating from New Mexico, they found the beauty and soil to be perfect for growing fruit and planted their families and their orchards here.
The city of Winters maintains a perfect balance of soil, weather and farmers who support and grow the finest walnuts in the world, Mariani Fruit handles the bulk of the walnut harvest and processing with a facility in Winters to be near the growers and their main packaging and transportation center in Vacaville where they just energized their new solar plant on site.
Also, Alza Corp or as they are now known as Johnson and Co, also operate their own solar array in Vacaville, not more than a mile from Mariani Fruit.
P G & E sub-station in Vacaville also offers natural gas pumps for those cars that use that fuel, and other electric car charging stations are conveniently located all over the bay area as well. Vacaville, Dixon, Davis and West Sacramento fully support the alternate fuels of the cars being developed in our backyards at the West Sacramento Fuel Cell Conglomerate building.
Experimentation of alternate ways to power vehicles will put California in front.
Solar power is such an interesting way to harvest electrical energy from the sun. It consists of a plate that is chemically layered with certain types of minerals and chemicals, they interact by differing from each other, and when exposed to the sun, they displace this difference and send it thru the wiring that is attached to the plates, if not used immediately by the load of a building or vehicle, this energy is instantly lost, so it must either be sent back to the electric grid if not used, or stored in batteries, since the power created is dc power, converters are used to change the power into AC current. If the power is sent to the grid, the power company is allowed to buy it directly from you, however interesting is that this will fast become another issue in the future as the power companies are already not willing to pay us the same amount of money per kilowatt hour as they charge us to get it. Legislation will have to address the issue. I believe the power companies are arguing that it costs money to take in power when their business is to sell power, not to buy it in small quantities from the general public.
Lastly, Vacaville is becoming the center of northern California for the number of solar homes they are building and have built in recent years. Most of these builders are installing a special roof tile that has the solar layers built right into them. Not all the roof tiles have the solar panels in them, and the power generated does not usually send the power back to the power company, but it sure helps with the bill! They call this spinning the meter backwards, and if you ever want to find out something interesting, try going out to your meter someday, have someone in the house turn lights and appliances on and off while the other person watches the meter spin. You will notice that the speed at which that wheel spins is in direct relation to how many things are on in your home, and they are not all equally as powerful at spinning the meter, your energy sucking appliances or the hanging light fixture with 9- 100 Watt bulbs may impress you when you watch it spin your meter! Power consumption is costly, with a little experimentation perhaps you can reduce your energy costs at home!
