Community energy facilities can be built anywhere:
- Brownfield sites (abandoned industrial sites and parking lots)
- Rooftops of warehouses and municipal buildings
- Unneeded parking lot space
- Sub-prime agricultural land
Community energy provides multiple benefits to all ratepayers:
- It lowers grid costs for all utility customers through avoided costs associated with energy generation, transmission, and distribution.
- It provides power when the grid needs it most—hot summer afternoons and evenings.
- It generates energy closer to customers, increasing the efficiency of the grid and reducing line losses.
- It improves grid resiliency during extreme weather events.
- It provides choices for customers.
- Independent community solar helps to avoid utility bill hikes. It uses private capital—not ratepayer dollars—to pay all of the costs associated with construction, interconnection, and operations and maintenance of the solar facility.