NC WARN’s sweeping new Sharing Solar campaign coincides with years of advocacy by leading proponents of a US transition to renewable energy
“The cheapest, most reliable power can be produced renewably and produced at/or near the customers — that is ‘distributed.’” That’s how clean energy guru Amory Lovins of the Rocky Mountain Institute says it. (“Freeing Energy” Podcast)
Last week, NC WARN began proposing a sweeping shift in the profit-driven monopoly mindset that increasingly harms communities, drives up power bills, and makes the climate crisis worse. All Duke Energy’s residential, commercial and nonprofit customers can share in the costs and benefits of clean energy much like we currently pay for polluting power plants – through the electric rate system.
We’re filing this proposal in the Carbon Plan docket at the NC Utilities Commission and we’re going straight to the public with a statewide campaign.
Under NC WARN’s Sharing Solar proposal:
- There would be no up-front cost for customers to add solar plus battery storage. It would be funded through the Rate System – just as we now all pay for dirty power.
- Local solar-with-storage can expand across NC quickly, inexpensively and equitably – with a priority on disadvantaged communities.
- All homes, businesses, nonprofits benefit in many ways – even if they don’t have solar themselves.
- Solar companies grow and create thousands of jobs in small towns and cities.
- It avoids the year-after-year rate hikes in Duke Energy’s high-risk plan to keep expanding fossil fuels and building experimental nuclear reactors.
Many experts agree that local solar plus storage is the best tool we have to address the climate crisis.
“When energy is produced and consumed closer to its source, less stress is placed on the electricity grid, which promotes energy resilience during mass power outages, an increasingly common occurrence as our planet warms and storms intensify.”
— Center for Progressive Reform, “Power to the People: Advancing Energy Equity via Customer-Owned Electricity Generation”
“Distributed solar, especially when paired with battery storage or micro-grids, is vital to creating a resilient and reliable energy system… Distributed energy can provide essential power even when the centralized grid fails.”
— Center for Biological Diversity, “Rooftop-Solar Justice: Why Net Metering Is Good For People And The Planet And Why Monopoly Utilities Want To Kill It”
“Rooftop solar projects produce power right where folks use it — eliminating delivery fees altogether. It’s the only option that provides generation, transmission, and distribution all in one package.”
— John Farrell (Institute for Local Self-Reliance), “The Free Delivery Farce in Solar”
North Carolina desperately needs an open, fair debate about our energy-climate future — not continuing deference to Duke Energy’s leaders.
See more experts supporting local solar-plus-storage (aka distributed generation) at this link.
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Now in its 36th year, NC WARN is building people power in the climate and energy justice movement to persuade or require Charlotte-based Duke Energy – one of the world’s largest climate polluters – to make a quick transition to renewable, affordable power generation and energy efficiency in order to avert climate tipping points and ongoing rate hikes.
