St Josephs Nudgee College

The Springers Solar commercial division has delivered a 300kW solar system for the prestigious St Josephs Nudgee College in Brisbane’s northern suburbs. 

As one of Queensland’s largest private day and boarding schools, Nudgee College aimed to significantly cut utility costs by offsetting daytime electricity consumption with solar energy. 

Nudgee College boasts large grounds and numerous facilities and buildings that operate seven days a week for most of the year. With 105 classrooms, a boarding village, swimming pools, widespread temperature control, and other intensive energy-using facilities, Nudgee College sought to significantly reduce expensive electricity bills and redirect funds into college improvements. 

Eddie Springer, director of commercial operations at Springers Solar, worked closely with Nudgee College directives to design a suitable, high-quality solar solution. Being a large campus with multiple switchboards and electrical zones, our design and engineering team carefully considered how to maximise production and consumption to augment return on investment. 

To achieve this, three 100kW solar systems were designed to be installed across three suitable rooftops across the campus. The three systems can communicate with each other via wireless relays to achieve a combined array capacity of 300kW. 

To deliver this project, our commercial projects team navigated numerous challenges, including:

• Site-specific engineering and wind loading requirements, given that one of the nominated rooftops was a sandwich panel roof. 
• Another nominated rooftop was too high to lift materials with a scissor lift. Therefore, we utilised a crane to lift panel pallets to the roof. Engineered drop points on the roof were necessary to maintain roof integrity. 
• A strict project deadline was in effect. The project had to be completed before term 1 began and students returned to school. Our installation team had three weeks to complete the project. 
• Over the three-week installation, the team experienced a number of rain days, resulting in delayed milestones and equipment hire. Agile project management was required to maximise the installation team’s time on rain days to avoid major project setbacks. 
• An intense heat wave across weeks 2 and 3 of the installation meant we had to carefully manage our roof team’s health and safety. We adapted to maximise productivity earlier in the mornings when it was cool and forced frequent hydration breaks to avoid staff burnout.

The project was delivered a day ahead of schedule, even with delays caused by poor weather. This installation is a demonstration of our project and installation team’s ability to adapt and remain agile throughout a complex and challenging installation. 

Nudgee College will generate approximately 441MWh of solar energy annually, offsetting 21% of the College’s total site energy consumption with 91% self-consumed solar. 

The College has reduced its carbon emissions by 20.3% by avoiding over 292.9 tonnes of CO2 released into the atmosphere per year. This is the equivalent of planting over 4,830 trees. 

To see the details and components of this installation, please watch our behind-the-scenes case study here.