Rooftop Solar in Lawrence, MA: Community Perspectives, Deceptive Practices, and Financing Options

Technical Report · Fri Nov 01 04:00:00 EDT 2024

DOI:https://doi.org/10.2172/2478829· OSTI ID:2478829

Breger, Dwayne ^[1]; Strong, River ^[1]; Hernandez, Jose ^[2]; Musalem, Natasha ^[3]; Gill, Elizabeth ^[3]

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1. Univ. of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA (United States)
2. Elevate Energy, Chicago, IL (United States)
3. National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), Golden, CO (United States)

This report was prepared as part of the U.S. Department of Energy's Communities Local Energy Action Program (Communities LEAP) pilot competitive technical assistance for the Lawrence Massachusetts Stakeholder Coalition (LSC) composed of The City of Lawrence, All In Energy, MassDevelopment, Mill City Community Investments, BlocPower and Groundwork Lawrence, and led by Browning the Green Space. The LSC identified rooftop solar photovoltaics as a top priority for this technical assistance opportunity. Lawrence faces high energy burden and electricity prices, thus rooftop solar can be a tool to help lower those costs. However, the coalition received feedback that some solar companies were using deceptive and unfair practices when marketing, selling, or financing solar energy, costing residents more money than utility rates and increasing the energy burden. This project sought to address rooftop solar community priorities through two pathways: 1. facilitating community engagement to understand community perspectives and experiences with rooftop solar development; and 2. conducting a financial cash-flow analysis highlighting the varying fiscal outcomes for rooftop solar adopters based off rooftop solar leasing, ownership, or buying electricity from the utility (National Grid).

• Research Organization: National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), Golden, CO (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE)
• DOE Contract Number: AC36-08GO28308
• OSTI ID: 2478829
• Report Number(s): NREL/TP--7A40-89428; MainId:90207; UUID:4b7a453d-e549-431d-ac8e-878c2ac7b447; MainAdminId:74315
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

14 SOLAR ENERGY
32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATION
Barriers to solar adoption
CLEAP
Communities LEAP
Communities Local Energy Action Program
Lawrence
MA
Massachusetts
community engagement
deceptive practices
predatory practices
rooftop solar
solar adoption
solar co-operative PPA modeling
solar energy for low-income community
solar financing
solar lease modeling
solar system ownership modeling