Declare What You Value
Most people openly profess to want a healthy environment, economic growth, reliable energy, and lower bills. Yet achieving such goals seems elusive. One empowering act is to rise above passive agreement and to advocate vocally for common sense legislation. In Indiana that means asking your state representative and state senator to support enabling legislation to unleash the benefits of independent Community Solar.
The electric utility agrees that renewable energy is a path forward for making the grid resilient, more secure, and less expensive. Opponents to solar farms call for more rooftop solar. But in Indiana it’s illegal for developers to facilitate a solar array in which subscribers get any credit off their bill for electricity their solar panels deliver to the grid.
It’s easy to be intimidated by what is happening at the Statehouse on wonky topics like energy policy, so please watch this most informative webinar, Community Solar: Nuts & Bolts, (https://tinyurl.com/enableCSP) co-hosted by Solar United Neighbors, Faith in Place, and the Indiana Conservative Alliance on Energy. Invest 78 minutes to envision your future and to launch your trajectory toward energy independence.
Energy policy will be an important topic in the 2025 session of the General Assembly, as data centers are flowing into the state in response to 2019 laws that give them generous tax incentives lasting decades. The resulting energy demand is extraordinary.
In St. Joseph County, for example, the South Bend Tribune reports 7 data centers are under construction with 9 more breaking ground. Each is the size of a Walmart Supercenter, with 14 smaller data centers possible. Another giant data center is planned on the other side of the county on 900 acres of the former St. Joseph Farms. The utility I&M Power forecasts data centers coming to northern Indiana will consume more electricity by 2030 than all 6.8 million Hoosier residents combined!
In brief, Community Solar is a means by which individuals who want to subscribe to renewable energy can tap into a local solar collective and receive a credit on their utility bill. For example, nearly 40% of the people who want to do the right thing are unable to build their own solar array. Perhaps they rent, or live in a high-rise, or have a shady yard, or can't make a big up-front investment, or have a restrictive homeowners association--they can't reasonably install solar. Community Solar would allow them to mount a nearby array with the combined investment of fellow 40-percenters, then get a credit in their utility bills for the clean energy they provide to the grid.
Concerned people who oppose solar farms often assert that developers should use more rooftops if some groups want to go solar, but that's not a viable option in the Hoosier State. In fact, community solar is legal only if specific utilities initiate it; independent community solar by private developers is not permitted! Imagine all the rooftops in Indiana that are deemed ineligible for solar because they would benefit ratepayers.
Here's the rub. A robust electrical grid would be a national victory, but the Indiana Statehouse Chairs who overlord utilities won't let enabling legislation for real Community Solar make it to the floor. A handful of politicians in Indianapolis are gatekeepers to a brighter future, holding the keys with one hand while doing favors for the monopoly utility with the other. Please, voice your disdain for special interests preventing energy independence.
Even the utility companies can't deny the value of solar energy, though they want to be the only ones who can monetize the sun. In its 2024 September Newsletter, Indiana Michigan Power openly and clearly declares the value of renewable energy, the kind of energy Community Solar provides:
"Renewable energy sources are not only reliable and cheaper, but they also strengthen the electric grid. Getting electricity from wind, solar and other renewable energy sources makes the grid more secure and resistant to service disruptions. Plus, batteries can store extra power until needed, making renewables an even more resilient option."
Community Solar serves ratepayers, the economy, the grid, and the environment. You can grow an industry; you can clean your air, water, and land; you can lessen the cost of energy even as demand grows. You can free people to pursue energy independence at their expense, not at other ratepayers' expense. You can lessen the need to build extra diesel capacity for peak demand--those are real costs and real pollution that are avoided.
Status quo delivers the opposite. The utilities serve the utilities. It's a fossilized model that has served us for decades, but must segue to a renewable future. Black carbon in the fuel continues to yield black pollution in the air, water, and land. Status quo means ratepayers have to pay for all peak demand with extra combustion, rather than letting Community Solar on a sunny day offset air conditioning demands. The traditional energy that has created so much global woe becomes further embedded. With status quo, the grid expands as a monolith rather than diversifying, and diversity yields resilience.
Consider how contrary it is for Chairs to oppose doing what's in our best interests. Even if you don't participate in a Community Solar plan, you still receive key benefits like clean air, clean water, and avoided costs. Yet the Chairs of the utility commission will bluster against Community Solar like the politicians of a Thomas Nast caricature. If they just repeat their claims often enough with a straight face, people believe the distortions.
When my State Senator asked her colleague why he opposed Community Solar, the Chair claimed it was a subsidy paid for by other ratepayers. On the contrary, as Brian Flory of Solar United Neighbors notes, Community Solar "is not a cost shift, any more than the utilities buying electricity from a utility scale solar farm is a subsidy. It's a different type of power purchase agreement, or PPA." The Chair will claim other ratepayers have to recover the costs lost to Community Solar, yet Community Solar participants in fact still pay for the use of the grid. And other ratepayers save with the huge avoided costs that the utility wants to foist on them.
The Chair's second argument is laughable, as he forwarded a conclusion from his committee's recent 21st Century task force (which was already decades behind when it was unveiled in 2022). The Chair claims no enabling legislation for independent Community Solar is necessary because "(8) Appropriate statutory authority exists for utilities to establish community solar programs."
Exactly! Who is the only party in Indiana allowed to establish a solar array by a party of two or more? The utility! Not individuals. That's not energy independence. As I've said before, the fox is in charge of the hen house. We chickens need to speak up for our best interests.
Thank you.
Excellent webinar describes the legislative process for enabling Community Solar. Co-hosted by Solar United Neighbors, Faith in Place, and the Indiana Conservative Alliance on Energy.
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