Community donation provides installation go-ahead

A GENEROUS donation of $10,000 from the Queenscliff Music Festival (QMF) will make sure a new solar installation is completed at Queenscliff Primary School (QPS) these school holidays.

At a special assembly before the Term 1 holidays began, QPS principal Mat McRae announced to students and parents the school would complete the installation of a large-scale, 29.9kW system with 72 solar panels as part of the state government’s Greener Government School Buildings program.

The $10,000 donation will assist with upfront costs of the installation, after school negotiations with the state government for a larger system were approved.

The system itself will also save the school $4,745 on its utility bill each year.

“This is a really special announcement for the school,” Mr McRae said.

“We applied for the Greener School Grants at the beginning of last year, we went through a bit of a process, and we were lucky enough to be one of the successful schools.

“We were offered the contract by the government, but part of it was not entirely suited to our school, so we worked really closely with Nathan Ulph from Queenscliff Climate Action Now (QCAN) to improve what our system looked like here at the school.

“We went back to the Greener School project team and received a larger system as well as a tilt so we could increase our energy production output.”

Queenscliff Primary School principal Mat McRae and Bellarine MP Alison Marchant.

The amendments to the state government’s proposed plan resulted in the school’s installation bill increasing. QMF’s donation will now offset some of the costs ensuring it will go ahead.

Mr McRae said the school hoped that during school breaks and holiday periods, the excess energy obtained by the school’s new system will feed into the Borough of Queenscliffe’s four newly announced community batteries.

QMF deputy president Fran Briard said the festival was committed to reducing its emissions at its events and was interested in partnering with the school for the betterment of the community.

“We’ve worked closely with QCAN to find local initiatives that help reduce carbon emissions, but also to assist in funding their efforts towards a ‘zero carbon’ community.

“The support we’re providing QPS has enable them to store a significantly larger solar panel array, increasing the savings for the school, and providing the opportunity for excess capacity to be redirected into our community batteries.