San Rafael Airport Solar Farm
A case story about incentivizing local renewable energy generation written as part of my Sustainable MBA program at Presidio Graduate School and subsequently published by Agrion [link]
— PROJECT NAME
The San Rafael Airport's Solar Farm: Local Renewable Energy Production via Community Choice Aggregation
— ROLE
Policy Analyst
Co-author
— DATE
Summer 2013
One of the ways that a sizable increase in renewable power generation has occurred in the state of California is through a policy innovation that led to novel energy authorities called Community Choice Aggregation (CCA). Originally designed as a means of ensuring power generation and plant operations are handled at the local level, CCAs have become an influential part of the energy innovation landscape in states like California where they are allowed.
Marin Clean Energy was the first CCA and it has pioneered various customer incentives to increase the amount of renewables on the local grid. One of its earlier programs used a feed-in tariff to encourage local renewable generation projects. The San Rafael Airport was an early partner of this program, and learned through trial and error how best to complete a solar farm utilizing hangar rooftops at its privately run facilities to run its operations and feed excess power onto the local grid.
This case story was an effort to educate other prospective renewable project developers and increase participation in a novel energy program.