Affordable Housing Developer Brings Solar
to Low Income Families and Seniors

The customer, Mid-Peninsula Housing Coalition, is a non-profit developer of affordable housing for low-income families and seniors. The DeVries Place project is a 130 unit Affordable Senior Housing Complex. This was new construction, so the greatest challenges were related to integrating the PV system into the design and coordinating with the general construction schedule. Even though this was new construction, the architect had finalized the design before CCEnergy was brought in to design the PV system. The flat roof had many obstructions that complicated the module array layout and required many shading studies to determine the best locations for the PV modules. The array is mounted at 10 degrees with the Unirac U/LA Mounting system on a cap-sheet roof. CCEnergy worked closely with the architect to run the DC conductors through conduit 5 floors down to the garage, where the inverters are located, while minimizing changes to the architect’s design. The PV system installation tasks were carefully scheduled with the General Contractor to make sure the structural attachments, waterproofing, and conduit runs were coordinated with the corresponding workers from the General Contractor so that they happened at the right time and did not cause any delays. The system offsets 50% of the House Meter’s electrical energy use.