UNITY — A solar panel that former President Jimmy Carter had installed at the White House — and has since been kept at Maine’s Unity College — will soon be heading back home.

That’s according to environmental author and activist Bill McKibben, who will announce tonight on The Late Show With David Letterman that the solar-panel road trip is part of an effort to get President Barack Obama to put solar back on the White House, according to a news release.

“Solar panels on the White House will remind every visitor to Washington that every roof in America should have solar panels for electricity and hot water on them,” McKibben said in a statement. “The president’s panels will do as much good as the wonderful organic garden that the first lady planted on the South Lawn.”

McKibben will be accompanied on the trip by a group of students from Unity who will tweet, blog and record video, according to the release. The road trip is slated to start Sept. 7 with a kickoff at Unity College and will continue with other events on the way down to Washington, D.C.