Solar Attraction

Kling Magnetics, Inc., SunDog Solar, and Solaqua Power and Art

by Ann Braybrooks and photographs by Hillary Harvey, September 24, 2007

Renewable energy. The arts. Combine the two to create a unique arts and business complex powered by sunlight, an existing waterfall, and possibly even recycled vegetable oil from local restaurants. Do this by rehabilitating and redeveloping a sprawling former box-board mill that straddles a section of the Stonycreek Kill, about a mile from the village of Chatham.

Add all kinds of cool things: artist studios; workshop space for ecofriendly woodworking, metalsmithing, and tilemaking businesses; and a huge green building center, where prefab homes with integrated energy-efficient systems can be manufactured. Maybe even construct a carbon-neutral ecovillage on the property adjacent to the mill, and simply move those energy-efficient, prefab dwellings down the road. Encourage residents to leave their cars in a lot off the main thoroughfare and use electric vehicles, or, better yet, their legs and feet, to
get to their front doors. Some residents might even be able to walk from work to home if they hold one of the “green-collar” jobs at the Solaqua complex, or if they work at the restaurant or performance space envisaged for the property.

Solaqua Power and Art is the dream of Jody Rael, owner and president of Kling Magnetics, Inc., a manufacturer of custom magnets and magnetic products, and SunDog Solar, a renewable-energy consultation and installation business that Rael launched this past August as Solaqua’s first incubator business. All three businesses, with about two dozen workers (some of whom change hats, depending on need), are housed in a combined offi ce building and manufacturing plant on the large mill property that Rael purchased in 1997.

In keeping with Rael’s green philosophy and plans for the site, eight solar electric (photovoltaic) panels mounted on poles have been installed alongside the dirt parking lot between the ’60s-era manufacturing plant and the century-old mill. The panels, which have been operational since June, provide 12.6 kilowatts of power to the building where Rael runs his three businesses and conducts research on renewables. The goal for the PV solar system is to off set escalating utility costs while conserving energy from nonrenewable sources, such as petroleum products. Rael hopes that the new system will handle one-third to one-half of the building’s energy needs.