Salt Lake County eyes solar for homes

After announcing an expansive plan to install solar panels on the roofs of Salt Lake County-owned buildings a couple of months ago, Mayor Peter Corroon is pushing forward with new measures aimed at making it easy – and affordable – for county residents to tap the power of the sun.

The county has teamed up with Salt Lake City, Utah Clean Energy and Kennecott Land and will solicit help from Sandia National Laboratories and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory to move plans forward. Current incentives available through utility companies and federal/state governments can reduce system costs by as much as 50 percent.

Ann Ober, Corroon's environmental policy coordinator, said a recent study, funded by a grant from the U.S. Department of Energy, will focus on identifying current hindrances to home solar installations.

"We want to find where the barriers are to residential solar," Ober said. "Based on the findings, the county's goal will be to remove those barriers … and institute a solar incentive program."

Concurrent with the launch of that study, and also funded with the DOE Solar City grant money, is the development of a new Web site that will function as a one-stop information source for those interested in utilizing their rooftops for solar panel installation.

Included in that site will be basics on the workings of residential solar power, equipment manufacturers, links to the various state, federal and utility company rebates/credits for homeowner-financed renewable energy systems and a handy calculator that performs cost estimates for those systems.

Kelly Knutsen, senior policy associate for Utah Clean Energy, is heading the Web site project and said some unique, new technology will be utilized to make the site particularly useful to residents. Site designers will have access to ultra-detailed Utah geographic information system maps created with laser-imaging equipment.

"These images show things like trees and obstructions that could greatly affect solar collection," Knutsen said. "Residents will be able to access the information on their homes and get a pretty good idea of what their (solar power) potential is."

Knutsen said a user-friendly calculator on the site will allow an easy estimate of system cost, based on location, mapping information and how much utility-provided power a resident wants to offset with their solar panels, minus the available credits for residential solar systems.