The final step on our “Green Conversion” has taken place with the installation of our new solar panels. Our machines are now powered by solar and batteries without a fuel guzzling generator. We now are green with our cups, our straws and our energy. It has been a very difficult journey to get it done.
It all started when our generator quit, and replacement parts were months away. We had always contemplated switching to solar and battery, but this event just accelerated our thinking. Our first stop was to consult with the battery people and the manufacturer of our industrial drink machines.
The battery people were a bit perplexed because they had never dealt with these types of machines with compressors continually cycling off and on. They also were a bit concerned with the placements of the installation of these huge batteries, inverters, chargers and solar controllers. With a lot of back and forth, we finally got everything specified in a way that it “should” work. Understand this was never done before.
Next it was on to the maker of our drink machines. Freezing anything is a huge consumption of power, especially at the rate that we were pumping out drinks. Lots of these machines have been installed in food trucks with gas and diesel generators but NEVER has one been hooked up to what we were designing. They were very skeptical and said if we went ahead, we would be pioneers. Well, the definition of a pioneer is the guy with the arrows in the back. And did we ever take the arrows. More on that a little later.
Products started to arrive. Since everything being shipped to us is very delicate, I was shocked at the packaging. Huge pieces of Styrofoam. So much Styrofoam that it pretty much filled an entire garbage bin. Plastic bands holding everything in place. Plastic wraps on everything. Instructions on purchasing huge quantities of heavy gauge cabling all wrapped in plastic. Wow, so this is what green looks like.
Over a matter of several months and tens of thousands of dollars, the installations were finally complete. Everything ran great until it suddenly didn’t. First, a mother board blew out. In electronics, when a mother board quits, so does everything else. Another mother board airfreighted to us. (Carbon footprint) Wrong one and in the process, the original design was questioned and determined to be faulty. Remember the pioneers and the arrows. More and bigger replacement parts sent, all duly packed in massive amounts of Styrofoam. At this point, we had to continue with the hopes that we could finally see the benefits of “green.”
Finally today, over 18 months since the start, we finally have what we think is the final piece of the puzzle and can proudly say we are about as green as an orange boat can get. We are happy and proud to have done this but were constantly reminded along the way that almost everything will have unintended consequences.