Member News

Member News

• March 25, 2019

  CESA Awarded Funding for Low- and Moderate-Income Solar Financing Models

  The US Department of Energy Solar Energy Technologies Office announced that CESA will receive funding for a three-year project that will build on three innovative low- and moderate-income (LMI) solar access and finance initiatives. The project will further develop these models and promote them in additional locations. The three initiatives are: (1) Efforts by Connecticut Green Bank to document the creditworthiness of LMI single-family homeowners and attract financial institutions, most notably PosiGen, to offer financing to the LMI solar market; (2) New Mexico State Energy, Minerals & Natural Resources Department efforts to develop “PV-on-a Pole” prototypes to be manufactured inexpensively and installed widely at manufactured homes; (3) Efforts by Clean Energy Group, foundations, and affordable housing organizations to use loan guarantees and other credit enhancements to finance solar+battery storage for multifamily affordable housing. Learn more *here*.

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• February 1, 2019

  Massachusetts becomes first in the nation to make battery storage eligible for energy efficiency incentives

  By Todd Olinsky-Paul, CESA Project Director

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• January 27, 2019

  Solar Best Practices for Under-Resourced Communities: A Comparative Landscape Analysis

  CESA has launched a new project with Alabama A&M University, the Partnership for Southern Equity/Advancing Equity and Opportunity, the University of Michigan School for Environment & Sustainability, and Woodline Solutions to research, write, and disseminate a report on the solar landscape in under-resourced communities. The report will identify the most useful strategies for advancing solar photovoltaic technologies in ways that benefit low- and moderate-income (LMI) communities. The project team will gather input from a wide range of stakeholders, including state and municipal governments, utilities, foundations, advocates for LMI populations, and the solar industry, and will especially seek to learn from the experiences of organizations that have deep roots in LMI communities. The report will tentatively be released in the Fall of 2019. The project is funded by the Nathan Cummings Foundation.

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• January 17, 2019

  New York’s Green New Deal

  New York Governor Cuomo has announced plans for a “Green New Deal,” an ambitious plan to accelerate the state’s clean energy economy. The Governor’s agenda includes:

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• January 15, 2019

  New Report on Community Solar Programs for Low- and Moderate-Income Customers

  Community solar has the potential to vastly increase access to solar for low- and moderate-income communities, especially for renters, but programs need to be specifically designed with those customers in mind in order to have the maximum benefit. A new report by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory and the Clean Energy States Alliance aims to help state program officials to design effective programs. The report, Design and Implementation of Community Solar Programs for Low- and Moderate-Income Customers, is available *here*.

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• December 18, 2018

  Historic, Record-breaking Offshore Wind Lease Auction

  Equinor Wind, Mayflower Wind, and Vineyard Wind are the *three provisional winners* of last Friday’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) competitive wind energy area lease auction. BOEM opened the competitive bidding process on Thursday morning for three lease areas off the coast of Massachusetts. The three lease areas sold for a combined price of $405 million dollars after thirty-two bidding rounds. Each lease area was auctioned at approximately $135 million. This historic auction and the record-breaking prices reflect the region’s strong commitment to offshore wind.

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