Solar homeowners are awesome! Over the last few weeks, more than 300 people from our solar community submitted a comment to our Public Utility Commission in support of net metering. We are so thankful for this amazing show of support. While we still don’t know the outcome, your voices matter. Check out why this is important for the future of solar.

Once again, our governor, with support from Vermont utilities, recommended that the value of solar be reduced. This will make solar power less accessible for families across the state and will hurt the solar industry as a whole. SunCommon and others across the industry are without question opposed to the recommendation. March 16th was the end of the public comment period to the Public Utility Commission regarding this recommendation.

The scientific community is telling us that we cannot drag our feet in addressing the climate crisis, and that we all need to act now in reducing our dependence on carbon-based fuels. At SunCommon, we see it as our obligation to do everything we can to accelerate the adoption of renewable energy across our state. So of course we submitted our own official comment to let the Public Utility Commission know that we strongly oppose decreasing the value new customers would get for the clean energy they produce.

We started SunCommon in 2012 as a market solution to climate change, to build a community of people inspired to address the climate crisis, and to work together toward a future powered by 100% renewable energy. We know that there is, and will continue to be, opposition from fossil fuel and utility companies whose approach is to make slow or modest steps, so as to not “rock the boat.” The problem is that we’ve been going slow for 30+ years. — their model means continuing to burn harmful fossil fuels while paying astronomical infrastructure costs to transport it — meanwhile the climate crisis keeps accelerating.

We know that if thousands of people speak up or vote with their dollars for renewable energy, we will see the transition to the electrical grid we need. This is why we asked you to speak up in support of progressive legislation that moves us in that direction. We are on the right path, but we still have a ways to go, and we want to keep doing this together. 

This round of public comments for our state’s net metering program has wrapped up, and we are now awaiting the PUC’s deliberation. Regardless of the final decision,  we at SunCommon will always be working towards that future powered by clean and local renewable energy. 

Thank you again for making your voice heard!