Boulderites may be preparing to plant their gardens in panels, not rows, this spring as a result of legislation passed last year permitting “solar gardens.”
Local energy experts will gather on Monday to discuss the development process for these cooperatively owned plots of panels, known as solar gardens, in a meeting that’s free and open to the public.
“(Solar gardens are) so new that nobody knows yet how they’re going to work,” said Rebecca Dickson, chair of the Sierra Club’s Indian Peaks Group. “What we do know is that they can work.”
The recent announcement that Xcel Energy, Boulder County’s utility provider, will decrease its solar energy incentive plan is not necessarily a harbinger of the gardens’ futility.
“As individual rebates for projects start to decline, there needs to be a new business model to get people to invest in solar,” said Jonathan Koehn, regional sustainability coordinator for the city of Boulder. “This creates another way to provide more solar to more customers.”
Community solar garden participants, called subscribers, will own a collection of solar panels cooperatively at a third-party location. The clean electricity produced will help to offset the owners’ electric bills.
These gardens could provide a viable alternative for individuals unable to put panels on their own homes, whether for practical or aesthetic reasons.
“Not everybody has a property that’s suitable,” said solar gardens expert Greg Ching. “They may have a house that is too shady or they might not like the look of (the panels).”
This option would also allow renters, leasers and owners of historically preserved homes to share in Xcel’s Solar Rewards Program. Koehn lists businesses on Pearl Street and the cottages at Chautauqua as interested participants.
Legislation spearheaded by state Rep. Claire Levy, D-Boulder, and supported by the City of Boulder made solar gardens possible. Now the Public Utilities Commission’s rule-making process has begun to further determine details, such as how rebates will be structured and whether garden subscribers will purchase panels individually or pay for the energy consumed.
Steve Bauhs, director of sales and marketing at Boulder-based panel installation company Simple Solar, estimates that gardens will be up and running within six to nine months.
Current legislation requires that at least 10 parties, any combination of individuals and businesses, buy into the garden. Subscribers must live in the same county as the garden itself.
The law limits a maximum of 6 megawatts of energy to be produced by gardens throughout Colorado and designates 3 megawatts to be used by a collection of small gardens (10-500 kilowatts), and 3 megawatts to be used by large gardens (500 kilowatts or more). Typical solar panel systems installed on homes have average generating capacities of 2.5 to 5 kilowatts of energy.
The law will be reconsidered after three years to determine whether alterations are necessary.
Ching noted that typically homes with solar panels belong either to wealthy individuals or technology hobbyists. Solar gardens would have the advantage of allowing lower income people to participate by setting aside a certain amount of panels specifically for them, he said.
Before the solar garden concept can move forward, however, rebate structures and purchasing arrangements will have to be resolved.
Bauhs, with Simple Solar, calls it a quandary to be solved through the ongoing rule-making process.
“(We have to) stay ahead of the game without really knowing what the rules of the game are,” he said. “You’re building the ship as you’re sailing.”
The panel, sponsored by the Sierra Club and the University of Colorado’s Environmental Center, aims to clarify some of these ambiguities, said Boulder’s Koehn.
“We want to make sure that once the rule-making process is complete, that we as a community are ready to facilitate the installation of solar gardens,” he said.
Read more:Solar gardens closer to sprouting in Boulder County – Boulder Daily Camerahttp://www.dailycamera.com/ci_17541487?IADID=Search-www.dailycamera.com-www.dailycamera.com#ixzz1HugZWRxw
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