Solar Garden | Summit County: Buying Into Clean Energy
Another is slated for the same time Tuesday at the Island Grill in Frisco. Appetizers are provided.
Attendees will learn about solar gardens, what it will take for Summit County to install one, the time line and potential costs. A solar garden is a non-residential array of solar panels that feeds energy onto the grid. Community members can virtually own any amount of solar energy from the garden, which is then credited to the utility bill as “installed wattage.” Depending on how the Xcel Energy arranges its incentives, it’s likely there will be additional rebates through performance incentives, but nothing will be clear until final rules are released in August, said Lynne Greene with the High Country Conservation Center.
“You can buy and produce solar power without putting in on your roof – with a cost comparable to installing your own system,” she said, adding that the purchase is transferable if the individual or enterprise changes location.
The Colorado Public Utilities Commission released its guidelines for solar gardens on July 25, Greene said, which means Xcel’s compliant rules won’t be far behind. She said it could be as early as mid-September that applications are accepted for initial community products.
Greene has been working with Carbondale’s Clean Energy Collective and Breckenridge’s Innovative Energy to understand and apply the changes as they’re occurring. The Clean Energy Collective built one of few successful, large solar garden projects in Rifle, Greene said. Theirs is essentially an ongoing project for which they need vested partners to make happen.
Those partners must be in the form of 10 citizens, businesses or public institutions committed to buying initial shares of
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