James Doherty, the architect and project manager at the National Park Service Office for White House Liaison, said, "The National Park Service as a whole has long been interested in both sustainable design and renewable energy sources. We also have a mission to lower our energy consumption at all our sites, and we saw an opportunity to do both at the White House grounds."

The system was placed on the roof of the main building used for White House grounds maintenance. The PV system directly feeds solar-generated power into the White House grounds' distribution system, providing electricity where needed. Two solar heating systems, one to heat the pool and spa and one to provide domestic hot water, were also installed.

The grid-tied PV system consists of 167 solar panels manufactured by Evergreen Solar that cover the roof of the maintenance facility. Installation was completed over a three-day period and it includes a data acquisition system for monitoring the performance of the array and its ancillary electronic components.

Publication date: 01/27/2003