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Efforts to spread solar get big boost in Sonoma County

SONOMA COUNTY – Solar Sonoma County was launched last week with a burst of enthusiasm from public agencies, private enterprise and politicians of all stripes.

Coupled with a pilot AB 811 district assessment program endorsed last week by Sonoma County supervisors to create financing of solar projects, Solar Sonoma hopes to streamline permitting and other processes for installations across the county.

“Our membership has snowballed,” said co-director Lori Houston. “We now have all nine major Sonoma County cities on board; the county water agency and PG&E are on the steering committee and they’re paying the cities’ first year membership fees. Agilent is a part of our larger working group, which we’re forming now.”

Two grants fueled the launch of Solar Sonoma, one local and one federal. Solar Sebastopol, hoping to see its pro-solar measures adopted on a county-wide basis, won a $75,000 grant from the Bay Area Air Quality Board Management District.

“What we had done was resolve that Sebastopol would generate one megawatt of solar electricity within city limits,” said Sebastopol City Manager Dave Brennan.

To that end the city lowered permitting fees and fast-tracked all solar projects. Every building in the city was surveyed with solar in mind, and a steering committee composed of solar vendors and suppliers and city officials notified owners via flyers and seminars of available energy audits and financing models.

“We conducted workshops for building inspectors and architects, we talked with lenders about the value of low-cost loans for solar and we urged appraisers to set a standard to establish the value of solar installations,” said Mr. Brennan.

Solar Sebastopol also enabled two low-income housing developments to finance solar though zero-interest bonds and higher-than-average rebates.

As a result of these activities and more, 70 installations with a total output of 500 kilowatts have gone in, with a 130 kilowatt project by the city itself nearing completion.

When Solar Sebastopol heard that the Department of Energy was funding selected cities with one-time Solar American Cities grants to establish them as models, it seemed a natural. But the guidelines specified a population of at least 150,000.

“We tapped the city of Santa Rosa and their utility department rose to the occasion immediately,” he said.

With the grant from the air quality district in hand, newly-formed Solar Sonoma County went after an American Cities grant as the only county to do so. It was one of 25 awarded $200,000 over a period of two years to put solar policies in place.

John Lushetshky, the U.S. Department of Energy’s Solar Energy Technology Program manager, said his organization was excited about the potential to extend the consortium model to regions without a major urban area.

“The uniqueness of Sonoma County coming forward as a single entity caused us to award it the grant, and we’ll be watching it very closely,” he said.

The long-term goal of Solar Sonoma is to standardize and streamline the process so that residents and businesses will experience the same policies and procedures no matter where they’re located, and to be a source of information on technical matters, financial models, incentives and general support during and after the installation.

Each winner of the Solar Cities grants can use the funds as it chooses. In Sonoma, funds are going toward the incorporation process, and the group must decide whether to choose 501c3 status, which limits its ability to lobby, or 501c4, which doesn’t.

An additional $200,000 in resources is available from the DOE for technical support and research. Solar Sonoma hopes to apply it toward solar mapping of the entire county, and also to gather data on what measures are being taken by other cities.

“It’s a complex process, but at the end of the two-year federal grant period we should have a solid collaborative structure in place which could be a model to other counties,” said Tasha Wright, a steering committee member and administrative analyst for the Santa Rosa Utility Department.

In some ways, Sonoma County is already a model. The Sonoma County Water Agency is one of the most forward-looking in the state, with solar installations totaling two megawatts of power in three locations.

“Our goal is to be a carbon-free water supplier by 2015,” said Assistant General Manager Grant Davis.

Locally and statewide, water treatment and supply accounts for 20 percent of all energy used, he said.

“It’s up to water agencies to take a leadership role in reducing carbon. That’s why we’re fully behind Solar Sonoma and very active promoters of its efforts and also of AB 811.”

The measure AB 811 would allow assessment districts to offer low cost loans for energy efficiency improvements which could be paid back through property taxes.