Solar Energy and Big Savings for Brisbane Child Care Centres.

At Sunny Hills child care centre in southern Brisbane, children arriving can’t wait to see their friends, their teachers, and unexpectedly, their solar energy kiosk.

It has become somewhat of a morning ritual to check what kind of power their centre is generating, and what kind of effect the weather is having on the solar panels.

For the centre’s owner, Vicky Gracen, this is mission accomplished.

“The great thing about the kiosk screen out front is that it starts the conversation, and once the conversation starts, you’d be amazed at how many children come back and say, I now know about solar energy,” she said.

“They see that and it makes it real and that sticks in their mind. In years to come when they’re vacuuming their floor they’ll say, I remember at kindy I learned that this uses a lot of power, I remember that big spike on the screen.”

These happy learning interactions are a wonderful side effect of what was initially a strategy to save big on power bills. To everyone’s delight, it has achieved both brilliantly.

Our happy ECE clients.

Sunny Hills is just one of the child care centres that we have delivered our child care package to. All of our ECE clients have saved at least 50% on their power bills, and have given us glowing feedback about the educational elements we provide.

We work hard to impress our clients, and seeing the joy and relief we can give early childhood educators is amazing.

“Before we knew it, we were actually seeing electricity being made with the app on the phone,” Ms Gracen said after installation. “It was right there in front of us. I really like the app because I can check it out at any time, it doesn’t matter where I am,” Ms Gracen said.

Cash back in your pocket.

After receiving a power bill for $2,433 for the quarter last year, Sunny Hills had had enough. They shopped around and selected Energy Partners for great service and solid savings and had their solar panels installed.

As a result, they saw their power bill fall to $1,270. They were thrilled with such an immediate and drastic saving – but we knew we could do even better for the centre. We suggested adding boosters to the solar panels, and with the eager agreement of the Sunny Hills team, we went ahead with the installation which made a huge difference again.

Their next power bill was just $291.46, an 88% saving, and we’re glad to say they are very happy with this outcome.

“Working with Energy Partners has made a massive difference,” Ms Gracen said.

“I highly recommend Energy Partners, and if you’re running a child care centre definitely put solar on the roof. It means that you can run absolutely everything and not worry about your power bill.”

Solar savings and environmental responsibility.

So what do the kids think about all this?

The kiosk is not only good for starting conversations about energy saving, but the kids think it’s amazing that they’re able to monitor electricity, and that they’re actually creating electricity and feeding it back into the grid.

“They really like the colour grid,” Ms Gracen said.

“It makes it very obvious, so the kids can talk about the colours. Red means we’re using something that we have to buy, while green means we’re using something that we made ourselves.

“They even play games with the kiosk screen out front! You can turn the kettle on and off or the vacuum cleaner on and off and see our energy use on the screen.

“When you were asking questions during the presentation, the kids knew that the solar panels were going to work to make electricity and that saves money. And I thought, they get it, they really do get it!”

We are so pleased with the clear learning outcomes our child care package provides to our clients. The benefits of clean, renewable, self-generated energy are evident to not only the adults at Sunny Hills child care centre, but also their young environmental stewards.

If you’re considering solar for your child care centre, have a look at our Solar Savings Calculator here or give us a call on 1300 76 89 77 to get your free quote or click here to contact us today.