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Site number: CM02 West Central Telephone Association |
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We are located on Hwy 71 North in Sebeka, MN. If you are traveling from the Metro area you can take I94 West to St. Cloud's Hwy 15 which becomes Hwy 10 West. Follow Hwy 10 West until Wadena; take a right onto Hwy 71 North about 14 miles to Sebeka. West Central Telephone is located on the right side of the highway, off the frontage road.
Our site features a wind/solar hybrid system, which is one of the Xcel RDF grant research sites.* This off-grid system uses a 1 kW wind turbine and 1 kW of solar power to completely and independently power a telecom equipment cabinet. You can see live real-time data of the power being produced, as well as historical graphs and charts, from our Energy Traker™ monitoring system. We will also have a map available leading you to other renewable energy sites in our area.
In addition, we have a separate 3.1kW solar array on a dual axis tracker, and a 1.9 kW fixed solar array mounted on our roof.
*Project funding provided by customers of Xcel Energy through a grant from the Renewable Development Fund.
The system cost was around $32,500, but it was part of the RDF Xcel grant that we received for research purposes. The grant was in the amount of $137,000.
We anticipated about 8 kWh per day or 2,552 kWh annually for the solar, and 4.65 kWh per day or 1,700 kWh annually for the wind.
We only have one month of data gathered at this point, but we have been averaging 9.6 kWh per day on the solar and less than 1 kWh per day on the wind.
This hybrid system is delivering 100% of our needs for the telecom equipment that it is powering.