HOW TO USE SOLAR ENERGY
AND SAVE MONEY TOO!
September 14, 2021
UUCA’s Green Initiative Team wants to help congregants fight climate change. One way to do this is to use electricity from solar farms as your source of electric power. This is great for people who wish to support solar energy without installing solar panels on their roofs. And, it works for renters, too! The state of Maryland has a program to support the development of solar farms in Maryland. It is the Maryland Community Solar Pilot Program, under the Maryland Public Service Commission. A community solar program is a purchasing program in which the electricity produced at solar farms flows to multiple customers. Community Solar customers pay for a percentage of the electricity produced by a specific solar farm, based on roughly 90% of that customer’s average utility bill. The customer receives a discount on the cost of the energy produced by the solar farm as well as a credit on their regular utility bill for the amount of energy produced. You would receive two bills, one from the community solar program for your percentage of the solar energy produced by your solar farm, and one from your utility company for any additional power you needed above that produced by your solar farm.
There are several choices of solar farms under each utility. Most have a standard discount of five to ten percent. Some have a higher discount for low to moderate-income customers, of 15 to 25%. To qualify as a moderate-income customer, a household’s income must be under 80% of Maryland’s median household income of $80,000 per year, and 80% of that is about $64,000 per year. To qualify as a low-income customer, the household income is based on 175% of the federal poverty guidelines, summarized below:
We are impressed with Neighborhood Sun as an excellent company in the community solar industry, for the following reasons:
- Local Maryland headquarters (Silver Spring, MD)
- CEO, Gary Skulnik, has a long history as a green advocate.
- Easy access by telephone as well as on-line
- It has several “partners” in the religious community (e.g., Interfaith Power and Light)
- Registered as “B” Corporation (it is allowed to have a community service goal as well as a profit goal)
- Neighborhood Sun discounts are very competitive in the industry.
- Neighborhood Sun has an open cancellation policy – (with a delay of 90 days).
- Policies for LMI (Low or moderate-income) customers are flexible- NS is willing to help clients through the LMI eligibility criteria to optimize discount.
For these reasons, UUCA has chosen to “partner” with Neighborhood Sun, meaning that for every signup done through UUCA’s “landing page” on the Neighborhood Sun website, UUCA will receive $50 from Neighborhood Sun. UUCA will designate those dollars to go to a certain cause, which is being determined by UUCA’s administration.
To Sign up for Neighborhood Sun Solar through the UUCA “Landing Page”, use this web address: https://ns.solarforall.io/signup.cfm?agent=UUCA. (If you have questions that need to be answered by a customer service rep at Neighborhood Sun, call 240-284-6245.)
If another community solar program meets your needs better than Neighborhood Sun, then certainly do what is best for you. To review your choices and sign up under BGE, go to https://cs.solarunitedneighbors.org/states/MD/programs/bge/subscriptions?usage100. For other utilities, go to https://cs.solarunitedneighbors.org/states/MD/programs, click “find subscriptions”, then click on “community solar subscriptions”, on the next page click on “select”, then click on your utility, then click on “Find Subscriptions”, then click on “Community Solar Subscriptions”. You will find an excellent description of the details of the available projects and can sign up online.
This is a way you can fight climate change and save money at the same time!