For senior Ellen Enkhtuvshin, board member of Protecting Our Planet, Glenbrook North’s environmental club, impact is only created when people take action.

“A lot of people talk about creating a more sustainable future and talk about all of these problems happening, but, really, talk is nothing without action,” Enkhtuvshin said.

The Guaranteed Energy Savings Project is a districtwide initiative that implements solar energy use at Glenbrook North and Glenbrook South. Glenbrook High School District #225 plans to install about 420 solar panels on the roof of the fieldhouse at GBN.

This project is a good opportunity for the district to do an installation of solar panels, said Dr. Kim Ptak, director of operations for the district.

“As we replace future roofs in the future, we can find good areas to install more solar panels,” said Ptak. “So we can keep increasing the percent of energy we’re not having to purchase, but instead we’re able to get through solar energy.”

“The solar panels will reduce our energy bill by about 8 percent, so it’s not a huge, huge amount that it will be supplementing,” Ptak said.

The project has several components, one being the installation of Tesla battery storage units on the property.

The batteries are being installed at the same time as the solar panels, but they aren’t operationally connected, Ptak said.

Two batteries are scheduled to be installed at GBN and one at GBS.

These energy storage units pull energy from ComEd’s energy grid, so when the company has excess energy, they can store it in our batteries, and during peak demand, we can push it back out to them, which is basically helping to support the energy grid, Ptak said.

The project expenses will be covered by year three, leaving the district with profitable revenue, Ptak said.

“By helping ComEd’s energy grid, after we’ve paid for the project, we’ll be getting revenue every year of about $500,000 for the whole district,” said Ptak. “So for North’s batteries, we’ll be getting half a million dollars a year in revenue that we can use for other capital projects.”

The storage units are set to be installed outside on the ground near the fieldhouse at GBN. The fieldhouse ground is currently under construction, and the project is scheduled to be completed in early June.

The project is meaningful because we’re trying to create a more sustainable future, Enkhtuvshin said.

“Seeing that their school cares about the environment, it might instill a sense of care in the students as well,” Enkhtuvshin said.