Well the Napa Valley wine country is certainly a wonderful place for growing terrific wine grapes, a fantastic travel destination, and now one of its finest wineries has set a standard for going green with solar power. Far Niente is one of the Napa Valley's premier wineries with a historic tradition that goes back to 1885.

This month they have gone on line with a solar panel array that provides the entire electrical supply for the winery, tasting rooms, cellar, and agribusiness operations. This was a risky financial undertaking for Far Niente but the owners felt it was necessary.

From the Far Niente release:

Napa Valley wine producer Far Niente has gone live with its “Floatovoltaic™” solar array, the first-ever system and technology of its kind in the solar industry. The Floatovoltaic installation creatively couples solar power with water, saving valuable vineyard acreage from being sacrificed for land-mounted arrays.

Far Niente’s Floatovoltaic system involves securing nearly 1,000 solar panels on pontoons, then floating the pontoons on the winery’s vineyard irrigation pond. Combined with a section of about 1,300 panels located on land adjacent to the pond, the array will generate 400 kilowatts at peak output, enough to offset the winery’s annual power usage and provide a net-zero energy bill.

The hope is that costs will be recovered, grapes will grow into terrific wines, and more Napa operations will foloow suit and use solar to power their operations. With innovative ideas like this who wouldn't?

Energy Tags: energy resources, battery technology