A nearly century-old building in the heart of Kansas City is getting a face lift — or, well, a roof lift.
"A building like this will run you $5,000 a month just in utilities," said Ben Kenney with the Scottish Rite. "This will bring some of that cost down and be more efficient and put some green back in the community."
The Scottish Rite of Kansas City, a local Masonic organization, looked to the heavens for a little help from above. While the assistance didn't come from God, it will come from the sun.
"We are going to light up these solar panels and help put some electricity back in our building," said Kenney.
So, just how do the panels work?
"They take free energy that is completely renewable and convert it to DC electricity and that comes down to the converter panels and converts it to AC electricity that the building uses everyday," explained Drew Neougher with Sunsmart Technology, the company installing the panels.
Once they're installed and powered up, 300 solar panels will provide up to 40 percent of the Scottish Rite's electricity. That means the organization, which relies of donations and dues to stay afloat, will be able to reinvest the money it saves back into community programs.
"In our building we have a Rite Care Clinic," said Kenney. "It's for small children between one and six [years old] that have speech and language disorders. We serve as an outpatient clinic for Children's Mercy, and a lot of this power savings will be put back into that clinic so we can continue serving children in the community."
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Terra Hall can be reached at terra.hall@kshb.com.
