NYC Agressively Targets 100MWh Electricity Storage By 2020, Boosting Solar Plays

New York City mayor Bill de Blasio has issued aggressive targets for New York City electricity storage and solar capacity, totaling 100MWh of storage by 2020 and 1GW of solar capacity by 2030.

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Tracking the development of NYC solar capacity

PVTech reports the city will issue permits for more than 3,000 solar panel installations this year, bringing the city’s total to over 8,000 in 2016. According to the de Blasio administration, the city is on track to hit its 2025 target of 100MW of solar power on public buildings and 250MW on private buildings.

Tracking the commitment to reduce greenhouse gas emissions

NYC has committed to an 80% reduction in its greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.

On April 22nd, de Blasio announced a suite of new energy efficiency initiatives that will dramatically reduce greenhouse gas emissions from New York City’s over one million buildings – of all sizes, types, and uses – and put the city on a pathway to an 80% reduction in all emissions by 2050, while creating green jobs and generating energy savings for building owners and tenants. The City also outlined a series of programs that will provide technical and financial support to building owners and managers in making these significant improvements.

“Cities that lead on climate, lead on buildings,” said Mayor Bill de Blasio. “We’ve set bold goals as we take on climate change and a clear path to meet them. The City has been leading the way by greening our own public facilities. Now, these new initiatives will dramatically reduce emissions from New York City’s over one million buildings, while saving New Yorkers millions and creating thousands of new jobs – and we’ll be providing owners support throughout the process.”

In addition, solar capacity has nearly quadrupled to 96MW from 25MW at the end of 2013. “This rapid progress has inspired us to expand that goal to 1,000MW of solar power citywide, which has the potential to power more than 250,000 homes,” said de Blasio.

Looking at Con Edison activity

Matthew Ketschke, vice president of distributed resource integration at utility Con Edison, stated: “We are actively working with government agencies and the solar industry to encourage more solar development. To this point, our New York City customers have completed more than 6,500 solar projects, producing about 80MW of clean renewable power. We’re the fifth-largest solar developer nationwide, and we’ve reduced our carbon footprint 48% since 2005, equal to taking half a million vehicles off the road.”

Staten Island has most solar installations to date, with 3,493 installations and 30.3MW completed, up 600% on late 2013. Queens is second, with 1,703 installations, representing 18.5MW, and growth of 275%; Brooklyn, the Bronx and Manhattan have also increased the number of solar installations.

The City has expanded funding for Solarize NYC, a program to increase access to solar through community group purchasing campaigns. The initiative is expected to lower costs by 10-20%, and increase solar capacity in communities that have had limited access.

The NYC Solar Partnership will work with up to eight communities each year to provide funding and support.

It has also launched a program to match developers with rooftop owners that can host large ‘shared solar’ installations and offer subscriptions to shares of the project’s energy output to renters and homeowners without suitable roofs.

The number of solar installations on public buildings has nearly doubled, compared to last year, to around 9MW of capacity, largely on school buildings – 35 public schools have installed solar, and 66 have projects underway, which will all together produce around 20MW of electricity when completed.

The city will release a report at the end of the year to recommend solar on all public buildings of over 10,000 square feet, paired with energy storage systems to provide peak load shaving and emergency backup power.

Earlier this month, New York utility Con Edison said it was offering local businesses incentives to install over US$5 million of cold energy storage systems. electricity storage.

Image via Shutterstock

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