Under the leadership of Mayor Julián Castro, the Mission Verde Center @ Cooper will become a multipurpose education, training and research center for renewable and energy efficient technologies and water management and conservation demonstration.  The center is located in San Antonio’s historic West Side neighborhood at the former San Antonio ISD James Fenimore Cooper Middle School.  

Mission Verde is San Antonio’s plan to build a 21st Century economy around ‘green’ technologies and initiatives that improve energy efficiency, utilize renewable materials, improve air and water quality and advance sustainability. Initiated by former Mayor Phil Hardberger, Mission Verde included six recommendations for designing and implementing a green jobs program in San
Antonio, including the creation of a living laboratory site for research and development, green skills training, internships and building retrofitting.

The Center will help advance the goals of Mission Verde by showcasing how investment in energy efficiency, renewable energy and water conservation can help create jobs and stimulate economic growth within the framework of a sustainable future. The Center will also play a central role in developing a new green jobs curriculum among educational stakeholders that align with the needs of green businesses and industries. Furthermore, the Center offers us an opportunity to harness green technologies and training programs to help revitalize neighborhoods.

In line with SAISD’s focus of “fewer, but more efficient schools”, Cooper Middle School has the opportunity to become a model for the nation for renewable energy, energy efficiency technologies and natural resource conservation and management strategies and related education and training.  This redeployed public school will provide convenient community access, easy parking, and unique physical assets that facilitate a unique blend of training and education, research and demonstration, including deployment of private sector product demonstration.

Core partners for center initiation include Alamo Colleges, San Antonio Youth Centers (SAYC), San Antonio ISD (SAISD), Texas Engineering Experiment Station (TEES), City of San Antonio (CoSA), CPS Energy (CPS), and San Antonio Water System (SAWS).  Additional public and private sector partners will locate at Mission Verde center either for short-term technology demonstration, research or as longer term partners providing services that address center’s goal.

The City of San Antonio has allocated $1 milliion in federal stimulus funding from Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant (EECBG) program for the development of the Mission Verde Center.

The City of San Antonio has allocated $1,000,0000 of its energy efficiency and conservation block grant funds toward energy improvements at the Mission Verde Center. The Texas Engineering Experiment Station’s (TEES) Texas Center for Applied Technology will design, implement and monitor these improvements. The City’s contribution to the campus will include a comprehensive audit of the facility to locate opportunities for advanced energy efficiency technologies. These retrofits will complement the workforce training efforts led by Alamo Colleges and San Antonio Youth Centers in weatherization, green construction and plumbing, solar power systems and smart grid systems installation. The following projects are planned as key components of the sustainability and energy efficiency retrofitting of the Center:

• Texas A&M SU CASA Solar House: Texas Engineering Experiment Station (TEES), a member of The Texas A&M University System, will locate a key asset, Texas A&M University’s award- winning Solar Decathlon House, at the Center.
• Energy Efficiency Retrofitting: Other near term projects will focus on enhancing the building environment and reducing energy costs with improved energy management systems and state of the art energy products plus examples of Smart Grid technology incorporating Advanced Meter Infrastructure (AMI).
• Conservation Projects: Additional sustainable projects will include water efficiency, and conservation. All of these projects will serve as demonstration and learning opportunities for students and neighborhood communities. A comprehensive energy and water audit will be conducted on the campus to establish the baseline for energy and water efficiency retrofits.
• Development and Deployment of Technology: These learning prospects will be enhanced by CPS Energy and SAWS, who will demonstrate and evaluate smart grid components, advanced electric and water meters, renewable generation sources and water conservation techniques.
• Distributed Renewable Energy:  48 kW of grid-tied solar photovoltaic (PV) power generation capacity will be installed at the Mission Verde Center. This solar project will consist of solar Array's mounted on the building's roof top and a parking structure.  This installation is grant funded by the Texas State Energy Conservation Office (SECO) using American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) dollars.

• Deliver training for “green” jobs meaning those with direct skills application in renewable energy, energy efficiency industries as well as natural resource conservation and management.
• Provide a vibrant learning environment for public school students and dual credit options for young adults to pursue their educational goals, attain a high school diploma, and gain college credit.
• Accelerate development and deployment of technology in existing and new renewable energy and sustainable water innovations.
• Create new business and job opportunities centered on renewable energy and sustainability.
• Facilitate community adoption of renewable energy, efficiency innovations and conservation strategies.

This endeavor is a community enhancement project that creates a gem from an underutilized school campus resulting in a premier center for learning, research and demonstration of green technologies. The Center will open in a phased approach beginning early 2010. As it develops, each of the partners will increase their participation while enlisting others to become a part.

The Center will eventually serve as a one-stop shop for energy efficiency and resource conservation to enable private customers, developers, landlords to become more efficient. As a cutting-edge, world-class center for sustainability, the Mission Verde Center will be a signature project not only for San Antonio and the South Texas region, but for the entire State of Texas.

The Mission Verde Center represents a unique blend of public education, community development, job training and research capabilities.  Co-location of these partners is purposefully designed to foster direct student and community access to the application of renewable energy, energy efficiency technologies as well as natural resource conservation and management strategies to spur economic and workforce development and community adoption.

For more information about partner relationships, please click here

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