The District 205 Board of Education held off this week on adding more solar arrays to King and Silas elementary schools. The district had approved solar arrays for different schools in the district in recent years and has seen significant savings already. Superintendent Dr. John Asplund said that conservatively speaking, the district has saved $172,421.89. These savings are seen with increased energy usage at the Galesburg Junior Senior High School building with the addition of air conditioning. Asplund presented the proposal to add an array to the ground behind King Elementary and to the rooftops of Silas Willard on Monday night. "Where we were getting 2.6 cents per kilowatt-hour, now it's at 5.5," Dr. Asplund told the board on Monday. "Other people are signing these at 7 [cents] because the cost of electricity – everything is going up. Inflation has made everything crazy." District 205 January personnel report: Who is coming, going within Galesburg schools? Asplund had told the board that electricity has almost tripled in the last year and currently is retailing for 11.3 cents a kilowatt-hour. A year ago it was 4.5 cents. The board had some reservations about the company behind the solar arrays, Clean Energy Design Group, due to how long it took to get the panels in the ground, secured, and turned on. Asplund said that while it was frustrating not getting the work done in a more timely fashion, he added that at least it has been done and the district is seeing savings. "I know other schools that aren't that far from us that have signed contacts with people two years ago that haven't even got anything into the ground. So, this company does put the solar array in and it does work. Is it perfect? No, but we are saving money." School board members held off on a decision until a more rigid contract was brought forward with hard dates and penalties for failure to follow through with the construction of the solar arrays.