With the recent main installation of the Northwest's largest solar power facility at the company's Wild Horse Wind Facility near Ellensburg, Wash., Puget Sound Energy (PSE) has reached 1,200 kW of combined solar power generating capacity.
In addition, more than 200 of PSE's customers in nine western Washington counties are generating electricity from their own roofs and backyards – primarily with 700 kW of solar system capacity. As participants in PSE's net-metering program, these customers offset their utility bills and get future credit by feeding any excess electricity they produce back to PSE's power grid.
Within the past year, the number of PSE net-metered customers nearly doubled, making PSE's metered program among the largest and fastest growing in the state, the company says.
Also, more than 300 additional solar panels will be mounted next spring outside PSE's Wild Horse Renewable Energy Center, about one mile from the much larger, newly completed first array of panels.