City of Oxford breaks ground on new solar project

The City of Oxford broke ground on a 1,355 kilowatt (kW) solar array spanning 2,520 panels at its wastewater treatment plant on April 22.

The new array, which was celebrated by the city on Earth Day, is projected to generate 1.75 million kW annually and will offset 78% of the plant’s energy consumption over the array’s lifetime, or around 28,280 metric tons of carbon dioxide. This is equivalent to planting more than 424,000 trees, according to a news release from the city.

According to the release, the solar installation is also projected to save $13,180,000 in electric costs at the plant over the course of 30 years.

Doug Elliott, city manager for the City of Oxford, said in the news release the city’s wastewater treatment plant is the largest user of electricity across all city-owned facilities, adding the installation on the plant’s grounds represents the first large-scale solar array for the city.

Melink Solar, a commercial solar engineering, procurement and construction firm based in Cincinnati, will provide the design, engineering, procurement and construction of the project. Additionally, it will monitor the services for the project.

Jake Kuss, a business development professional at Melink Solar, said of the project, “It’s great to see it from the ground up, where the City of Oxford recognized an issue – electric bills are rising.”

“They have a plant that uses a ton of electricity,” Kuss said. “This is the type of site where solar makes a lot of sense.”

Kuss said the installation itself will cost the city an estimated $2,567,373, which he estimated will be “paid back” with the money the city saves from using solar between seven and eight years.

Kuss said he is beginning to see a lot of municipalities like Oxford take advantage of solar projects. For example, he said Melink is currently in construction on another solar project with the City of Fairfield at its wastewater treatment plant.

“Yes, this is environmentally sustainable, but it’s also going to create a very predictable financial outlook for the wastewater treatment plant, and so it’s financially sustainable, as well,” Kuss said. “It’s a huge benefit for municipalities that are thinking about projects like this.”

Kuss talked about other, smaller ways to increase energy efficiency, such as switching out incandescent light bulbs for LEDs around the city. 

“The City of Oxford has obviously made huge strides in the sustainability efforts, and so solar is kind of at the end of the line here where they’re starting to address on-site generation once they’ve taken care of those easier, lower-hanging fruit items,” Kuss said.

In fact, Reena Murphy, City of Oxford sustainability coordinator, said the city already reduced its carbon emissions by 35% between 2019 and 2023, and the array will drop the city’s emissions by another 10%, getting the city closer to its mission to decrease government emissions by 50% by 2030.

“I think (the installation) shows that the city is trying to be responsible to not only the taxpayer, but to the environment,” Murphy said. “We are exploring solar at other facilities, as well. (We) don’t have hard updates on those yet, but we are not taking our foot off the gas … or maybe the EV pedal, I suppose.”

Murphy said the city is waiting on the completion of a system impact study, and will have a better idea of a construction timeline afterwards. But once construction begins, Kuss said the array should take around seven to eight months to complete, after which it will become immediately operational.

The city’s Climate Action Plan, adopted in September 2023, committed the city to achieving carbon neutrality by 2045.

Murphy said although the city believes in the importance of leading by example, the government’s emissions are only a “small slice” of the larger community’s emissions. 

Peggy Branstrator, a member of the Oxford Environmental Commission and the Climate Action Steering Committee who is responsible for organizing Oxford’s locations on the National Solar Tour each year, said although the city’s on target to reduce its carbon footprint, “The general community is going to have to have a lot more buy-in by everyday citizens to reach it.” 

Branstrator said she’s been trying to raise awareness about lowering carbon emissions for years, and her message to the community is to make the investment in solar and save money in the long term, or try to find other affordable ways to reduce emissions.