Special to the Vanguard
Davis, CA – The City of Davis City Council will consider a proclamation at their Tuesday night, April 19, 2022, regular meeting that celebrates the community achievement and the Cool Davis-City of Davis collaboration on the “Double Up on Solar” campaign, finishing with a total of 4,598 residential rooftop solar photovoltaic systems citywide as of Feb 28, 2022. The proclamation also challenges residents with the means to do so to adopt 100% renewable energy either through a rooftop solar photovoltaic system, choosing energy provider Valley Clean Energy’s UltraGreen option for 100% renewable energy, or purchasing an electric vehicle.
The original goal deadline was set for 2020 but the pandemic disrupted that timeline. Representatives from the City and Cool Davis are happy that progress did continue despite pandemic work stoppages, supply chain disruptions, and quarantines.
Double Up on Solar Campaign Chair and Executive Vice President with Citadel Roofing and Solar, Aaron Nitzkin is proud of the community’s achievement: “Davis residents have been on the forefront of solar adoption for years. When we set these ambitious goals for the city, we knew that they weren’t going to be easy to achieve, but we were optimistic that homeowners here in Davis would rally around the mission. And sure enough, Davis residents have stepped up to keep Davis as one of the top cities in the United States in terms of solar penetration per capita.”
John Walters of RepowerYolo and Jon Gemma of Aztec Solar were also members of the campaign planning team, along with City of Davis Sustainability Coordinator, Kerry Loux, and Tessa Tobar and Mitch Sears of Valley Clean Energy. Tessa is now an Energy Programs Analyst at Central Coast Community Energy. Cool Davis staff members Chris Granger, Christine Backman, Erin Reddy, and Leslie Crenna also participated on the campaign task force as well as Alex Sauerwein, a Civic Spark Fellow. Alex is now an attorney for the State Water Resources Control Board.
The City estimates that “Davis residential solar PV installations equate to GHG reduction of over 20,000 metric tons of CO2 emissions per year or the equivalent of carbon sequestration by 909,000 trees.”
The accomplishment is especially remarkable considering the watts per person from rooftop solar photovoltaic systems in Davis is second only to that of Honolulu, the perpetuate Shining Cities Report winner for most solar per capita among big cities. Including commercial and government based photovoltaic systems, and a 2020 population of about 70,000 (a bit low in our 2020 no-student pandemic census year), Davis scores an impressive 484 watts per person of solar with this new milestone.
The report ranks the City of Los Angeles with the highest total wattage with 483.8MW DC capacity in 2020, and the City of Honolulu with the greatest watts DC per capita at 840.88.
The proclamation reports that “Davis solar PV systems represent 33% of total Yolo County residential rooftop systems and an investment of over $100,000,000 by local homeowners” and that this “community solar PV achievement has contributed to an overall decline in electricity demand in our community since 2010, despite building more homes and other increased electricity demand such as electric vehicle charging.”
The achievement will be feted properly during an Environmental Recognition Awards event to be held at Peregrine School Wednesday night, in-person for the first time since 2019, including the awardees for all three “pandemic” years.
Shining Cities website and report
https://environmentamerica.org/feature/ame/shining-cities-2020
Find out more at Cool Davis Solar campaign page
After all the pro-solar, anti-tree comments that didn’t receive the pushback it deserved (see https://www.davisvanguard.org/2022/04/planning-commission-approves-recommendation-to-increase-solar-energy-at-expense-of-trees/ ), I conclude it’s time to double-stop solar in Davis until we get our heads screwed on straight. The obsession with solar so deep that it is leading to developers and city commissioners being OK with cutting down living mature trees in the name of alternative energy is sick, sick, sick — as in mentally deranged.
Double down? No shut down!!!
No more solar until mental illness has been removed from the equation.
“No more solar until mental illness has been removed from the equation.”
Are you being ironic again?
Not sure what you mean. “No” – I think. I’m making a point that it is sick to tear down trees to install solar. Trees are life. Trees shade structures. Trees are what makes Davis live-able. No irony. It should be illegal to tear down trees to put up solar.
Can’t we all just get along?
Wouldn’t go as far as you (tongue in cheek?) do, but does everyone know how much carbon emissions are built into the mining of materials, fabrication of, distribution/installation, maintenance, eventual replacement of solar systems?
I know, I don’t know the answers… but as another ‘frequent flyer’ here might say, “I wonder…”
I do opine that “until we get our heads screwed on straight”, know more, think it all through, the solar zealots (particularly those who want to require solar in all new construction, and mandatory retro-fits) should ‘cool their jets’ [a source of carbon emissions]… reminded of the possibility of the Pogo quote, ‘we have met the enemy and it is us’…
There are almost always “tradeoffs”… ‘taking from Peter to pay Paul’, if you will…
TNSTAAFL…
[BTW, depending on your time horizon, ‘solar’ is not sustainable… the sun will either implode or explode… (beyond what I expect to be my ‘time-line’]
Here’s one estimate. Generally its about one year of output from the solar panels and this has has been declining at manufacturing and the panels get more efficient.
https://greenchemuoft.wordpress.com/2017/12/12/embodied-energy-and-solar-cells/
Looks like an answer as to total energy… doesn’t seem to speak to total carbon…
Did I miss something? Quite possible…
Unquestioned belief in “renewable energy” is a cult.
No, they don’t. In fact, the believers don’t even question that. Let alone question how electricity is usually produced.
I “wonder” why the questions aren’t even asked. (See the definition of “cult” for an answer.)
This is no accident – it’s “taught”.
It will expand and swallow the earth.
And possibly Mars, from what I recall. (Certainly any colony there would be unlivable, by then. Maybe a future Elon will figure out how to leave the solar system, by then.)
Or maybe, humanity is not the “end-of-the-line” for life forms in the universe.
And at what point do we just not care about that, either way? (I’m pretty sure that the world will end as soon as I die, regardless. And did not exist before I was born. As such, I believe all history is fake.) 🙂
“Collaboration”, indeed. Isn’t “Cool Davis” a paid contractor, for the city?