Power by nature

In about a month, Steven Segal and his wife, Catharine Mouton, will be able to step outside their new home and take in the nature surrounding it. The Katy Trail borders the southwestern edge of their property, and the Missouri River is visible from the deck. When they step back inside, the idyllic scenery will stay with them.

“Big open spaces and embracing nature is the major theme behind the house,” said Segal, a professor in MU’s Department of Medical Pharmacology and Physiology.

The largest windows, which are square and measure 36 square feet each, sit at the corners. The architecture of the West Terrapin Ridge Road house is based on a modern version of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Prairie Style. The couple can stand at one corner of their home in a rural subdivision west of Columbia, and through the many windows, they can see all the way across the deck to the trees on the other side. The expansive windows bring space and sunlight into the home.

And there’s more.

The house will have both active and passive solar elements and is one of the first resi-

dences in Boone County that will generate its own electricity through photovoltaic, or PV, solar panels on the roof.

“Aside from creating a really cool house, we wanted to make it a prime example of a socially responsible house for the future,” said Brian Segal, Segal’s cousin, who designed the house.

Because of the passive elements of the Segal-Mouton residence, the interior temperature should remain at about 65 degrees year-round. Shading devices and other passive materials, such as insulation, are designed to maximize energy from the sun. The production of electricity by the PV solar cells through the house’s grid-tie system also qualifies it as an active solar house. When sunlight hits the silicon crystals inside the PV panels, it excites the electrons inside, which develop a direct electrical current. The power then flows through an inverter that converts the DC voltage to 120 or 240 volts of alternating current. This is the typical electrical current that powers household appliances.

The grid-tie system will be hooked up to the Boone Electric Cooperative grid. At night or on a cloudy day, when the PV system cannot generate sufficient electricity, a two-way meter will turn forward and draw electricity from the power company.

Anytime the system generates more electricity than the home needs, electricity will flow in the opposite direction, and the meter will turn backward, sending power back to the grid. Excess power will be sold back to the cooperative. The process works on voided cost, which means electricity is purchased at the standard cost of about 8 cents per kilowatt-hour, and sold back at a lower cost of 2 to 2.5 cents per kilowatt-hour. The house could produce a yearly average of 500 kwh per month — a typical house uses a monthly average of 1140 kwh.

Voided cost is required by state law. States like California and Montana, where solar houses are more common, use a net metering system that uses the grid as a storage battery, and at the end of the year the homeowners can sell their energy credit back to the power company.

Steven Segal said, “We’re hoping to help advance the thinking here in Columbia and make the use of solar power more common in the daily lives of Missourians.”

Pioneering this sort of change isn’t cheap.

“We don’t discourage solar cells, but any power they put back into the grid is not the full retail price,” said Chris Rohlfing, the manager of member services at Boone Electric Cooperative. “There is a cost involved in putting that service to the customer. Voided cost can still charge the customer and still try to capture the investment of having that unit there.”

Rohlfing said Boone Electric Cooperative is still in the process of establishing the costs. The special metering system, a backup safety disconnect and any other required hardware will add to the cost of installing a line to the Segal-Mouton residence. The inverter, which is unique to the system, must meet certain requirements set by Underwriters Laboratory Inc., a not-for-profit organization that tests products for public safety and national electric code specifications. The electric company will cover the cost of running a line to the home, but the extra costs will be covered by the homeowners.

“We don’t want our lineman working on a line and causing safety concerns,” Rohlfing said. “(We’re) going to be very specific about the hardware that makes it work safely.”

Brian Segal, who has designed solar homes for nearly 30 years in Bozeman, Mont., said the solar features will generate 60 to 70 percent of the household’s energy needs. Although Columbia has a more favorable latitude position than solar houses he has designed before, Missouri is generally cloudier. The amount of power generated by the PV system will depend entirely on the weather. It’s a costly gamble. Brian Segal said that the initial cost of an active and passive solar home is about 10 percent more than a non-solar home. The Segals did not disclose the cost of their home.

“We didn’t do this to save money initially because it is a significant up-front investment,” Steven Segal said. “The primary reason we’re doing it is to be able to rely on green energy production for a significant portion of our energy needs and to help bring green technology to Columbia.”

Brian Segal said he tried to make the house as energy efficient as possible. He installed the PV solar cells and the solar hot-water system with the help of technicians who specialize in the solar energy field. Each component of the PV systems has varying rates of payback. The hot-water system should pay for itself in five years. The PV system will take longer to pay for itself, depending on state regulations and the cost of electricity, Brian Segal said.

“Each individual has to make their own choice,” Brian Segal said. “Steve and Catharine have made a grand statement that it’s important.”

Segal and Mouton say Brian Segal succeeded in tailoring the home to suit their lives.

“There is a lot of our personalities in this house,” Steven Segal said.