Climate Mitigation and Resilience Fast-Track Measures; Clean Energy, Solar Freedom, Energy Efficiency

Overview

The County Executive and County staff were directed to research the following items aimed at increasing the use of solar and other renewable energy sources throughout the County, including: * Identifying locations where solar panels and battery storage backup power could increase sustainability of County services. * Scaling up the County’s building energy efficiency program to meet the Climate Mitigation and Resiliency target of County Government operations achieving 100% renewable electricity by 2030. * Implementing solar power on County Government buildings/property through a 3rd party Power-Purchase Agreement (PPA) or purchase of Renewable Energy Certificates (RECs). * Encouraging new data centers to purchase clean energy through PPAs and RECs. * Engaging with SolSmart Virginia to help make solar permitting faster, easier, and more affordable for businesses. * Scaling up residential solar by encouraging residents to participate in the Solarize NOVA program . * Requesting that the Virginia Department of Energy conduct a SolSmart consultation and identify the County-owned buildings where installation of solar panels and additional energy efficiency measures would be cost-effective. * Updating the Zoning Ordinance and DCSM to encourage the use of less carbon intensive or carbon neutral backup systems over diesel or petroleum-powered backup systems. * Coordinating with the Virginia Building Code Officials Association to determine what strides could be made towards clean energy implementation from a statewide code perspective. * Incentivizing the conversion of existing diesel and/or oil backup power systems to low carbon or carbon neutral systems. * Researching programs - such as community choice or local aggregation - which may allow the county to procure renewable and other alternative energy on behalf of residents, businesses and government operations while still receiving transmission and distribution service from existing providers. Such research should, where applicable, include timelines, fiscal impacts, and other pertinent impacts for consideration by the Board of County Supervisors. When the research and work is complete, the County Executive and County staff should report back to the Board with the research and recommendations during a Board meeting or by memorandum, as appropriate.

Supporting Materials

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