
Today, the New York City Council’s Infrastructure Task Force convened what was arguably the most substantive public forum ever held on the complex subject of distributed energy sources and the New York City electricity grid. During the course of the four hour hearing, which was hosted by Hunter College and included three separate panels of experts from the academic, engineering and business communities, solar photovoltaics was singled out during much of the conversation as the leading clean energy prospect for the five boroughs. A number of cost and technical issues were raised and discussed at length, but perhaps the single most exciting idea to emerge from the hearing was that of the Solar Empowerment Zone.
The term, coined by Council Member Garodnick, describes a policy that would identify areas of the city wherein properties would be eligible for extensive incentives for solar investment. While the policy idea is in its earliest stages of development, zones would be designated on the basis of their vulnerability to summertime power disruption, as well as prevailing building type (buildings with few stories and large roofs would be given highest preference). Zones would be designed to scale up solar capacity in the city at an exponential, rather than incremental rate. Realization of the concept would establish, irrefutably, the Big Apple’s leadership position on the national stage in renewable energy adoption and innovative policy making.
Solar One staff consulted closely with Council Member Garodnick in the planning of the hearing, and moving forward, will mobilize it’s I Heart PV campaign in support of the Solar Empowerment Zone policy. We thank Council Members Garodnick and James for their leadership, hard work and vision.
Stay tuned for the next developments in this very encouraging policy direction.
Click here to read the NYT blog synopsis of the hearing.
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