By Paul Tuthill
http://stream.publicbroadcasting.net/production/mp3/wamc/local-wamc-998366.mp3
Springfield, MA – Massachusetts is one of the fastest growing areas in the country for solar power. State officials credit the growth on a market based incentive program. It has attracted private investment in solar power projects and reduced the amount of state subsidies needed to prop up solar as a renewable energy source. WAMC's Pioneer Valley Bureau Chief Paul Tuthill reports.
Over the last two years, the ability to generate electric power from the sun in Massachusetts has more than tripled. The Massachusetts Department of Energy Resources says solar capacity went from 20 megawatts in 2010 to over 60 megawatts by the fall of this year.
Much of the growth was from projects that qualified for the Massachusetts Solar Carve-Out Program. A thousand projects from small residential solar panel installations to big commercial developments were facilitated by the market base incentive program since it began two years ago. More projects that will produce an additional 20 megawatts are in the pipeline.
The incentive program is expected to help Massachusetts reach a goal of 250 megawatts of solar generation by 2017 according to the Massachusetts Secretary of Energy and Environmental Affairs, Richard Sullivan.
To help finance solar projects, Massachusetts uses Solar Renewable Energy Certificates .One credit for each megawatt hour a solar project generates is sold at auction to utility companies which are required by the state to purchase six percent of their power from renewable sources.. Dwayne Breger, the director of the renewable energy division at the Massachusetts Department of Energy Resources says prices for the solar renewable energy certificates can go as high as 550 dollars ten times that of other renewable energy credits .
Solar installation has become a booming business in Massachusetts. Tom Hunton, heads American Capital Energy of North Chelmsford Massachusetts. His company , which builds large scale solar energy facilities was the fourth fastest growing private company in Massachusetts this year, according to Boston Business Journal.
One thing the growth in solar power has not done is to lower the region's high electric rates , according to Peter Clarke, the president of Western Massachusetts Electric Company.
Western Massachusetts Electric Company has two large solar energy facilities in western Massachusetts. Its first in Pittsfield, went on line last year and the second in Springfield was completed in the fall. The solar panels were installed on a remediated brownfield site in Springfield's Indian Orchard neighborhood.
Western Massachusetts Electric Company has also proposed a solar power project at a former landfill in Springfield. More than 2 dozen communities in Massachusetts have, or are planning to, put solar panels on top of their capped and covered landfills.