Maryland Pushes to Be National Leader in Solar Industry

In Maryland, where $18 million of the $54-million federal stimulus package is slated to spark economic recovery via alternative energy, a local delegate is pushing for a new bill in the capitol that would make solar energy more affordable to homeowners.

Sue Hecht (D – Frederick County) spoke in Annapolis recently about the bill, which – if passed – would target residential solar energy as the most promising venue to create new jobs and reduce the cost of electricity on a house-by-house basis.

The act, as proposed, would mandate that regional energy suppliers meet a certain percentage of output as solar energy credits, which would come from residential solar panels.

Several energy companies, including Pepco and Delmarva Power, oppose the measure, saying that it creates extra costs that will have to be absorbed by the power producers.

Maryland, like other states, faces an energy crisis. Customers of Baltimore Gas & Electric are facing a 72-percent increase this year. Consumer interest in solar, which spiked in the early 1970s, faded when federal and state incentives dried up in the 1980s. Now, the threat of skyrocketing energy costs, and rolling brownouts as soon as 2011, have consumers reconsidering their solar options.

In 2007, Maryland lawmakers approved an initiative that would mandate two percent of the state’s power from solar by 2022. In January of 2008, state lawmakers also designated almost $600,000 in grant money for residential and small business solar installations, and upped each grant from $3,000 to $10,000. The state has also waived sales tax on solar panels and peripheral equipment (HB670), promised not to up property taxes to reflect solar installations (SB621), and provided a venue for homeowners and businesses to sell renewable energy credits from the electricity generated by solar energy systems.

Maryland counties have also participated in aggressively pushing solar, with tax exemptions available in Anne Arundel, Harford, Montgomery and Howard counties. In the latter, participation has risen more than 400 percent in the last year alone.

A complex of bills called the Solar Energy Act fall under:

HB 700, which would allow solar thermal installations to be eligible for renewable energy credits, or RECS, which utilities would purchase and apply towards the renewable portfolio standards (RPS). HB 1236, which would establish a Maryland Clean Energy Loan Payment Program that would provide financial assistance for renewable energy or energy efficiency projects for residential projects that uses bond financing to support loans against property taxes similar to a program established in Berkeley, Ca. These low-risk loans allow homeowners to pay off the cost of solar installations on an installment basis. HB 1060, would mandate an electricity supplier like Pepco to collect renewable energy credits, or RECs, specifically from small, distributed generation solar energy to meet the Maryland’s RPS standard.

According to Malcolm Woolf, the director of the Maryland Energy Administration, these bills, if passed, would put the state in a position to become a national leader in the solar industry. Proving yet again that solar is more than the sum of its parts, and relies on the vision and enthusiasm of regional leaders to achieve parity with conventional forms of electricity.

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