Avon cuts the ribbon on ‘unique’ all-electric public works garage
The garage, which will house the town's snowplows, required collaboration and special planning to avoid natural gas
Chris Kendig/Courtesy photo
Avon is driving forward with its climate goals — literally — by building an all-electric facility for its public works vehicles.
Members of the Avon Town Council and Holy Cross Energy affiliates cut the ribbon on Wednesday for the town of Avon’s new, all-electric public works garage.
The facility is Avon’s first designated public works garage, giving the town’s snowplows and their drivers a warm place to operate out of in the winter.
“We all know the importance of snow removal, which makes the difference between keeping our town running and having our town come to a standstill,” Mayor Tamra Nottingham Underwood said. “It is Avon’s snowplow drivers that are the first on the road in the very early, cold, wet and dark hours of morning. They are clearing and opening the roads for all of us.”
Nottingham Underwood also made sure to call out the town’s snowplows — “including not only our beloved Mikey-T Snowplow, but also our famous Slush Puppy, our Rocky Plowboa, our Plowy McPlowface and, of course, the Big Leplowski” — at the ribbon cutting. Just like Bob the Bridge, the names came from residents in naming contests.
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Building an all-electric public works garage is a relatively new concept, as most large buildings that need to be heated use a natural gas-powered system.
“The town was not able to identify any existing examples of all-electric public works garages, which left our team with the challenge of creating a unique design for this facility, rather than copying an existing design,” Nottingham Underwood said. “Not inexpensive, of course.”
Avon’s public works garage relies on solar energy collected via 24 kilowatts of DC solar panels on the facility’s roof and stored in 60 kilowatts of batteries to run its boiler system. The battery-stored energy kicks in during Holy Cross Energy’s peak times, enabling the town to avoid putting further strain on the electrical grid.
“The design of the solar panels, the batteries and the electrical heating system required broad and creative collaboration of many consultants, our contractors and our staff,” Nottingham Underwood said. “The town of Avon has the most exemplary and competent staff in the valley, probably in the state, and it’s only because of Avon staff that this town is as successful as it is.”
It took “a lot of iterations” to move to an all-electric design, said Nicole Moseby, Avon’s senior engineer.
From start to finish, the project took about 17 months and cost the town around $4.6 million. Adding the solar panels and battery added nearly $200,000 to the price tag and lengthened the construction timeline, but it was worth it to the Town Council.
“The town of Avon council debated whether to commit to an all-electric design, which bucks the status quo in the conventional design of garages,” Nottingham Underwood said. “After much debate, and knowing how lucky we are to partner with Holy Cross Energy as our electricity provider, Avon council recognized that the time is now.”
In 2025, HCE is “over 85% carbon free already, and on the way to being net zero carbon by the end of this decade,” said Bryan Hannegan, president and CEO of Holy Cross Energy.
“This really, truly is an example of making sure that we’re providing the valuable public services that our people in this valley need, but doing so in a way which is more sustainable than ever before, and more likely to keep those things that we really care about, like snowfall and snow removal, from going away anytime in our near future,” Hannegan said.
