Beyond the Grid: Suncoast Organic Farm moving toward energy independence

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“We grow it, we bake it, we brew it, we live it.” That’s the motto of Suncoast Organic Farm Bakery owners Lisa and David Jensen as these Hollister residents work toward a completely off-the-grid, sustainable business and lifestyle. 

The couple’s timber frame home was also designed for sustainability and is now entirely off the grid. Their wood-fired bakery, the 7-barrel brewery and the farming operation, with more than 500 fruit and olive trees, a hop yard, two gardens and a greenhouse across 27 acres, while still partly on the grid, are all maintained and run with the help of a 56 solar panel installation and battery backup system.

“Going off grid is not a simple deal,” David said. “You’re your own power company and you have to think about what’s going on. “It’s not something where you can just set it and forget it.”

Turning to alternative energy sources to avoid escalating energy costs, and brownouts and blackouts, might be out of reach for most residents and businesses, but at Suncoast Organic Bakery, it is a necessity.

“I think when people make business plans,” Lisa said, “they do not take into consideration their energy costs. And it could be more than your rent. Our bills would be astronomical if we didn’t have solar.”

The experiment with alternative energy began in 2016, when David and Lisa began the construction of their home, located in proximity to the barn they converted to a bakery.  

“Going solar was always the plan,” David said. “We determined that it was going to cost too much to bring in power all the way from the street. PG&E would need to upsize the cable coming here.”

They began by submitting a solar plan to the county, which also had to go through the fire marshall because of the roof installation. The installation was done by now-Supervisor Ignacio Velaquez, who handled the permitting and the coordination of the new system with PG&E. 

Now finished, it has supplied 100% of the power for the home and covered 40% of the bakery and brewery needs, including the refrigeration, powering the glycol chillers for the brewing operation and running the pumps for their well.

Understanding what their power consumption is and what’s going to be powered is critical to the success of their operation. This includes tracking the ebb and flow of the power generated by the solar panels.

“The way an off-grid or a battery-backed-up system works is that you’re basically charging your batteries and you’re keeping those topped off,: David said. “So when you use your power, it has to be done strategically.”

For instance, he said, they can’t run their irrigation systems at night because it would drain the batteries. So all watering has to be scheduled between 10 a.m. and 3 p.m., when the panels’ electricity generation is at its peak. 

And he is experimenting with shutting down the glycol chiller during peak usage hours to see if its insulation will keep it within the proper temperature tolerance to “avoid being clobbered by the higher rates.” 

“I’ve had to map out all of the various electrical connections,” David said, “and every single load center. I’ve got some devices that can help by separating and tracking all the equipment we’re running to determine how much power is being used by each.” 

According to David, this requires constant monitoring throughout the day, “looking at all of that little stuff,” to ensure there are no complications with the system. 

“I’m constantly having to walk by the solar panel inverters every day,” he said. “I am always checking them to make sure I have no warning lights that maybe I’ve got a short or the generator didn’t start the night before, or you’re below voltage.”

Since the current solar system and batteries, even with programmed use and constant vigilance, are not yet sufficient to generate all the power Suncoast needs, it will be a while before the Jensens can go off the grid. 

Until then, they still need to pay PG&E for peak usage, which is slightly offset by the excess energy they are credited for, which is being sent back to the grid during the day. 

“I think we only get a nickel back for every kilowatt,” he said. “PG&E charges you almost 60 cents for power on peak and, off peak, around 39 cents. So, for a lot of people, it almost doesn’t pay to put the solar on your roof.”

There is also a true-up at the end of the year, where the Jensens have to reconcile the difference between what they used in power off the grid and what their system generates. David estimates this will be $16,000 this year.

All the more incentive to increase the size of the system, he said. 

“I’m working on something that’s going to eliminate our bill,” David said. “But we’re not there yet.

That would be installing more solar panels and then a battery system that would allow us to use the power during the peak times, going into the evening.” 

He said that since installing the first system technological advances have made systems available at a third of the price he initially paid, with more efficient batteries and redesigned controllers.

As it stands, however, he said the existing system he has installed is the difference between being able to run the bakery and brewery and an onerous financial burden.

“I think that the economics of not having it would force us to shut things down,” David said. “If we didn’t have the panels, we’d probably have a $ 3,000-per-month PG&E bill. I have no idea how businesses in town manage it now.”

Suncoast Organic Farm can be found online through their website, Instagram and Facebook.

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