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Naiviivi Primary School  (1652 Cakaudrove)

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Works & Maintenance

CO2 & $s

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About

Naiviivi Primary School, on Qamea Island in the North East of Fiji, in 2023 has six teachers are providing classes for 135 students in classes ranging from years 1 to 8.

The school 5KVA generator is used to power the school photocopying machine, laminating machine and for charging. Also, three of the teachers' homes draw power from the generator when it is running. Getting fuel to the island is costing almost as much as the fuel itself - the solar system is diverting significant funds to education as well as reducing carbon emissions.

The school had two very small solar systems, each powering one room, but the lead acid batteries failed quite some time ago and the systems were not functional. Those batteries were removed and sent for recycling. Similarly the teachers' quarters/homes have small two panel systems and those batteries also have failed or are failing. All are now receiving reliable power from the new solar system.

School Role & Facilities
Students:
Teachers:
Classrooms:
Kindergarten:
Offices:
Library/computer area:
Teachers homes in the school grounds:
Boarders (live-in students):
Hostels (Boarding houses):
Dining rooms:
Comments and other bulidings:
Date entered:
Project Funding

Project is supported by the Rotary clubs of BERRY, MILTON ULLADULLA, NAROOMA, ORANGE, MOLONG, GERRINGONG SUNRISE, JERRA ROTARY, COOLAMON, BATHURST DAYBREAK, BATHURST, PAMBULA, JUNEE, HALL, FORBES IPOMOEA, CLUB MEMBER - KEN LEACH (Club Member), GRIFFITH AVANTI, CANBERRA WESTON CREEK, COWRA, OBERON, BELCONNEN, CANBERRA, ORANGE NORTH & GOULBURN.

Our school commits to have a group of students spend at least 15 minutes, most weeks, picking up plastics. So, we keep our small patch on the earth as free of plastic as possible - its a small action we do to protect marine and other wildlife. We hope all schools in the world join us in doing the same.

For sustainability

Our projects

Plastic Pick up Activity

Started: 2023 Status: Ongoing
One or more of our team spends at least 15 minutes each week (or at least one hour each month) picking up plastics in our area. So, we keep our small part of the earth as free of plastic as possible - it's a small action we do to protect marine and other wildlife. We hope all businesses and organisations in the world will join us in doing the same.

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Carbon Dioxide and Financial Savings
Document
The school was spending almost as much on transporting fuel to the island as it was on the actual fuel. And the very old generator was costing also a similar value to maintain. So the savings presented here are significantly underestimated.

Naiviivi Primary School

Annual school fuel saving (litres) (1)

600

Annual fuel saving 6 teachers' homes getting solar (litres) (2)

300

Annual cartage saving (litres) (3)

90

Total annual fuel saving (litres) (4)

1,020

Fuel saving over 30 years (litres)

30,600

Annual CO2 saving (kgs)

2,601

CO2 saving over 30 years (kgs)

78,030

Annual AUD saving (8)

$ 2,940

Annual USD saving

$ 1,999

Annual FJD saving

$ 4,410

30 yrs AUD saving

$ 88,200

30 yrs USD saving

$ 58,740

30 yrs FJD saving

$ 129,600

Total of All It's Time Solar Schools

Total annual school fuel saving (litres)

20,540

Total annual fuel saving 91 teachers' homes getting solar (litres)

4,150

Total annual cartage saving (litres)

3,081

Total annual fuel saving (litres) (4)

27,886

Total fuel saving over 30 years (litres)

836,580

Total annual CO2 saving (kgs)

71,103

Total CO2 saving over 30 years (kgs)

2,133,277

Total annual AUD saving (8)

$ 78,672

Total annual USD saving

$ 53,489

Total annual FJD saving

$ 118,008

Total 30 yrs AUD saving

$ 2,360,160

Total 30 yrs USD saving

$ 1,578,540

Total 30 yrs FJD saving

$ 3,482,640

Assumptions

Fuel cost in the islands in AUD/litre (5)

2.00

Fuel cartage consideration % (3)

0.15

Annual fuel consumption per teacher's home wired (litres) (2)

50.00

Annual generator maintenance consideration AUD (6)

1500.00

CO2 produced per litre of fuel burned (kgs) (7)

2.55

AUD to USD conversion rate used

0.68

AUD to FJD conversion rate used

1.50

Notes

(1) This is the annual fuel consumption based on reporting from the school at the time of school survey and affirmed at the time of installation. It refers to direct fuel use by the school, not including teachers' homes.

(2) The fuel consumption of teachers' homes varies considerable between homes and over time. Their sources of energy varies from their own small generators to shared generators, still some use kerosene for lighting and some small solar (often failing) for lights and charging. Recently on Beqa Island two of the 7 households at one school were each using 10 litres of fuel per week and some were using very little. So, we have chosen the conservative underestimate of each household saving of 2 litres per week (approx. 5 kgs of CO2).

(3) Most schools have a cost to get fuel to the school - usually small boats and car/truck on the mainland. The costs vary from small amounts to some schools where the cartage cost is almost the same as the cost of the fuel itself. The cartage consideration (dollar and carbon cost) is a percentage of the total fuel consumption, because it varies widely from school to school we have chosen quite a conservative estimate.

(4) Includes cartage and teachers' home consumption estimate that therefore contribute to the total CO2 saving. But we do not include the teachers home in the financial saving - rather we just refer to the savings from the school generator.

(5) This is the current published diesel price in Fiji presented in AUD. Often the islands pay a higher price, but that is not factored in, so generally the price will be a small under estimation.

(6) Generators often require repairs and eventually replacement. That cost varies significantly from school to school, so a conservative value is applied to represent this component of cost/saving for all schools. It is not possible to calculate that accurately for every school, hence the estimate across all.

(7) Burning diesel produces CO2 at a rate of 2.68 kgs/litre, whereas petrol produces it at a rate of 2.31 kgs/litre. We have chosen 2.55 as the approximate for our calculations because there is more diesel used than petrol in the school generators.

(8) The fuel savings in the teachers' homes are not included in the calculation of financial savings for the school. Although teachers are asked to make a small contribution each term (FJD70) for their now 24-hour power and this goes to the school to buy more education resources.

Specifications
Document
04 April 2023

DC Coupled

Inverters

Inverter type

Outback FlexPowerOne

Charge controller

1 x Outback FlexMax 80

Panels

Panel type

Canadian Solar CS3U-380MS

Number of panels

15

Array (watts)

5700

Mountings

Mountings

Ground mounted

Brand

Clenergy PV-ezRACK Solar Roof

Batteries

Battery type

Simpliphi PHI 3.5 Lithium Ferro Phosphate

Number of batteries

6

Kilowatt hours

20.0

Batteries mounted

ICS Industries (Enersys) Cabinet


General electrical works

Considerable refurbishment of the wiring to the school and removal of old unsafe wiring. New wiring to the year 6/7 classroom and the kindy. Reticulated (300m) circuit to supply power to the 6 teachers' homes and added new wiring, LED lights and power points to the teachers' homes.


4 amp breakers are installed into the teachers' homes - this limits appliances to less than 1000 watts (so no electric cook tops etc., but capacity to use modest sized electrical appliances). That power limiting strategy means effective use of a reasonably sized school solar system and all in the community are very happy to have this level of 24-hour power supply.

Note the system has 3000 watts of panels powering the system at the moment - extra capacity is included in the array but on used due to issues with the original inverter that failed on arrival and the 3000W unit was installed. Therefore we retain the option to increase the inverter size in the future.


Partners

Solar contractor

CBS Power Solutions

General electric works constractor

CBS Power Solutions

Contacts
Document

Enter all contacts e.g School Manager, Head Teacher, Principal. The more the better.
If a contact changes, for example the principal, edit the old record to show the new person’s details.

New First Name Last Name Position Phone Email FB Note Edited
Charge data
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