Webinars and Workshops
Note this page is under construction- check back frequently for updates!
Municipal Solar Workshops
Hosted by energy planners from Addison County and Central Vermont Regional Planning Commissions, this 3-part workshop series is intended to support member municipalities interested in municipal solar projects. Throughout the series we will be joined by community and industry experts to build a set of best practices and help communities identify and meet their communities’ needs. Participants are welcome to join 1 or all workshops in the series, materials and resources will be provided throughout to help participants navigate the process regardless of where they are starting from!
These workshops may be for you if: you are town staff or leadership, and you interested in solar but don’t know where to start or what is needed, the prospects of funding requirements and project management are overwhelming, you have found plenty of resources for residential, commercial, increasingly community solar, but are not sure how they relate to a municipal project; you want to connect with neighboring towns and co-develop projects which maximize financial, social, and environmental benefits and draw down federal funds to your town!
Our goal is to (re)define municipal solar, help towns understand what municipal solar CAN BE, and connect you with the resources and experts to begin the process.
Municipal Solar Workshop Resources
Part I covered an overview of different models of municipal solar and provided the broad strokes of how to develop and implement projects (moving towards a step-by-step workflow!). In addition, to your regional energy planners Sam and Maddi, we will be joined by experts from Norwich Solar.
Part II focused on how to get started with siting municipal projects, demo-ing available tools (including the new Act 174 Planning Atlas Map Viewer) that can be used for project development as well as to facilitate community conversations. We touched on basic considerations re sizing, storage, and dual land use to frame project development best practices.
Demo and 3 different approaches using the Act 174 Planning Resources (VT Planning Atlas) starts at 15:36 in recording (tips where to start slide 13):
- Quick site evaluation; identification of known and possible constraints by address (ground mounted)
- Prime and Base Solar for project development
- Rooftop Solar Potential