ENVIRONMENTAL DEFENSE FUND
Clean Energy Investment Potential: Sub-Regional Profiles
…Expanding renewables and energy efficiency is a key pathway to building community resiliency to extreme weather, energy and economic challenges.
- Transitioning to renewables can achieve greater energy independence, protect communities from price spikes and ensure more reliable power during heat waves and other disruptions, while creating new jobs in the process. Solar panels will capitalize on an increasing number of sunny, hot days in Los Angeles County, an area that already has tremendous solar capacity only beginning to be realized.
- Energy efficiency programs can help residents, businesses and municipal government save money and energy, lower carbon emissions and reduce demand on the grid during severe weather events.
Changes in energy conservation and generation began decades ago in California, but transformation will involve a sustained effort with benefits for action realized now. For one, there are state and local funding vehicles to support investments in energy efficiency and renewable energy projects such as rooftop solar installations.
The proceeding profiles contain details about these needs and opportunities for clean energy investments at the local level throughout Los Angeles County. Each profile illustrates the geographic distribution of:
- 1) Vulnerability to climate change;
- 2) Existing environmental health vulnerabilities that will be exacerbated under climate change;
- 3) Rooftop solar capacity; and
- 4) Energy efficiency potential at the parcel level by sector.
The maps in each profile also highlight likely local recipients of two new and large sources of state revenue for energy efficiency and local renewable energy projects. The profiles are organized by the nine sub-regions in the Los Angeles County, using the boundaries defined by the Southern California Association of Governments.
Together, the maps tell a compelling, albeit short, story about the needs and opportunities for clean energy investments in and across each sub-region. Additional information on sustainable energy can be found at www.innovation.luskin.ucla.edu.
Arroyo Verdugo Subregion: Solar Capacity
The Arroyo Verdugo Subregion is endowed with both bountiful sunshine and numerous buildings that offer valuable siting opportunities for solar energy generation. This map identifies the rooftop solar opportunities across neighborhoods in the Arroyo Verdugo Subregion. Economic development planners, building owners and anyone interested in expanding solar power can use this map, along other parcel level analyses, to identify potential investment opportunities. Because cost-effectiveness increases with the size of a solar installation, the map statistics table presents the number of potential solar projects by size and the total rooftop potential.
Jobs: If just 5% of total rooftop solar potential in the Arroyo Verdugo Subregion was realized, approximately 740 job years would be created.
Pollution Reduction: This would also eliminate 31,577 metric tons of carbon dioxide pollution each year
Funding Opportunities
State policies that expand opportunities for solar include the potentially billions of dollars from Proposition 39’s Clean Energy Job Creation Fund as well as the AB 32 Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund (cap-and-trade auction proceeds). In order for the Arroyo Verdugo Subregion to benefit, policymakers will have to be vigilant to ensure that residents, businesses and schools have access to these opportunities.
Job training will also be supported by Proposition 39. The map identifies solar job training sites that could be eligible for these resources.
Local policies also provide financial incentives for solar investments. Southern California Edison offers incentives through the California Solar Initiative, including rebates on solar equipment and installation. Residential and commercial customers could also be eligible for Net Energy Metering, which gives you credit for the electricity generated by your solar system. Burbank Water and Power offers a Solar Support Rebate Program that provides rebates for commercial and residential solar systems. At the time this profile went to print, Glendale Water and Power’s Residential Solar Solutions Program is oversubscribed but accepting applications for the wait list.
Download full version (PDF): Profile of Clean Energy Investment Potential Los Angeles County
About The Environmental Defense Fund
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The Environmental Defense Fund is “a leading national nonprofit organization, which creates transformational solutions to the most serious environmental problems. The Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) links science, economics, law and innovative private-sector partnerships.”
Tags: Arroyo Verdugo, CA, California, EDF, Environmental Defense Fund, Los Angeles County, Solar
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