By Frank Andorka, Senior Correspondent
Lobbying – and organizing lobbying – is often a thankless job. It requires hours of glad-handing, of having a phone of some sort permanently glued to your ear (well, not literally, but you know what I mean) and often without any recognition of what you are doing and/or accomplishing.
That’s why it’s important to recognize those folks who do an amazing job at keeping solar moving forward at the state level, and that’s why this post is dedicated to the amazing team at Vote Solar who, as luck would have it, are having a fundraiser on October 18. All of us should attend (if possible – I hear it’s a kick-butt party) or at least send your money to support their often heroic efforts to fight for solar policy at the state level. Their accomplishments are many, but here’s just a handful of their most recent successes (and this is literally just in the past month):
- New Mexico Terminates Punitive Charge on Solar Customers – Thanks to intense lobbying from Vote Solar and other solar advocates, New Mexico ordered its largest utility to stop sticking it to solar customers by eliminating a usurious charge called Rate 59. The change is going to save solar ratepayers approximately $300 per year
- Vote Solar completed a report that found that the community solar pilot program in New Jersey could generate $800 million in ongoing revenue for the state. The report was issued shortly before the first community solar projects in New Jersey were unveiled – so there’s reason to believe the report had an impact.
- Thanks to intense lobbying from Vote Solar and other industry groups, California Governor Jerry Brown signed SB 100 into law, establishing an aggressive goal of generating 100% of California’s electricity from clean energy by 2045.
- The Arizona Corporation Commission listened to Vote Solar and other solar advocates and told two of its utilities to knock it off with exorbitant fixed charges, freeing future solar consumers for being penalized for going solar.
- Vote Solar helped the Nevada Public Service Commission develop a proper framework to improve the ability of renewable resources to be integrated into the state’s electrical grid.
Given that they did all this with the resources available to them, can you imagine what they can do if we all supported their noble efforts?
So throw a little money into the tip jar to support the Vote Solar Equinox fundraiser. They do the work behind the scenes that you never see but that makes your job immensely easier.