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Minnesota Going More Green
This Article was Written By Tom Meersman, Star Tribune
Hopes are high at the State Capitol that the right mix of dollars and policies are in place to give solar energy in Minnesota a needed jolt.
Solar energy will now be serious business in Minnesota, thanks to a critical mass of federal stimulus dollars and state policy changes. Legislators, mayors and industry executives ticked off a list of big changes at the State Capitol on Thursday.
“If you want to be a leader in solar, you’ve got to grab that market now, and that’s exactly what we have done in the 2009 session,” said Sen. Ellen Anderson, DFL-St. Paul and chair of the environment, energy and natural resources budget committee.
Solar energy has barely been a blip among the state’s sources of electricity. But incentives signed into law aim to make that grow: $3 million for solar rebates for homeowners and businesses, $3 million for solar development along University Avenue between Minneapolis and St. Paul, and $6.5 million in grants to school districts and local government to purchase and to install solar and other renewable energy systems.
Minnesota has solar potential, according to the National Renewable Energy Laboratory in Colorado, although not nearly as much as areas of the central and southwestern United States.
Target the obstacle of cost
But the hangup hasn’t been the amount of sun, said Linda Taylor, clean energy director for the St. Paul-based Fresh Energy, a nonprofit policy group.
“The problem is it’s still too expensive,” Taylor said.
“We need to start getting the kind of [manufacturing] scale that’s going to bring the cost down, and increase demand in the market for better technology.”
That can be achieved, said Taylor, by helping businesses and homeowners finance solar projects.
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