Pocono Raceway becomes world's largest solar-powered sports facility
A 25-acre solar farm will power the track and provide energy to the local grid.
By Helen JupiterMon, Aug 02 2010 at 7:07 PM EST
Photo courtesy of poconoraceway.com Pocono Raceway, one of NASCAR’s most competitive speedways, became the world’s largest solar-powered sports facility when its 25-acre solar farm debuted this past weekend, The New York Times reports.
At an initial cost of $16 million, the solar farm will eventually power the entire racetrack, and supply enough energy to the local grid to power 1,000 homes. The project is the brainchild of Brandon Igdalsky, 34-year-old grandson of track CEO Doc Mattioli. Igdalsky, who serves as the track president, originally conceived of a much smaller project, but Mattioli suggested clearing a large parcel of land that had once been used for parking lots.
With 39,690 solar panels on the farm, the Pocono track, known as “the tricky triangle,” will save several hundred thousand dollars a year on its electric bill.
"This is the largest solar project, [the] largest renewable energy project at any stadium anywhere in the world — not just America, but the world. We're the largest solar plant in Pennsylvania; [the] 10th largest in the country," Igdalsky said.
The solar project was developed by enXco and is one of several improvements planned for the track, which has been criticized for being unsafe. The renovation will include the removal of obsolete steel guardrails and construction of SAFER barriers.
Comments
Brandon
08/03/2010 12:49 PM
It's great that influential venues such as Pocono are hopping onto the green bandwagon. That aside, being in the solar industry, I might’ve recommended a crystalline PV technology here for a couple of reasons; I’ll call these reasons the “efficiency argument” and the “land argument”.
The “efficiency argument”: While thin film might harvest more kilowatt-hours on a foggy day than crystalline PV, and while its proponents might argue its efficiency outperforms that of a.... More
