Old Port City, New Energy Tricks
Once the global center of the whaling industry, New Bedford, MA is becoming a national leader for photovoltaic solar power.
Located 60 miles south of Boston, New Bedford, MA is a city that has experienced a succession of economic evolutions, from whaling in the 19th century to textiles and commercial fishing in the 20th century. New Bedford was the global center of the whaling industry from the early 1800s until the industry steadily declined following the discovery of petroleum in 1859, and the price of whale oil dropped substantially. Around the same time, the textile industry was growing in the city, with the first textile mill chartered in 1846. At the height of the industry’s success, the city’s cluster of textile manufacturing was among the largest in the nation, employing more than a third of New Bedford residents.
Today, with the clothing manufacturing industry a shadow of its former self, New Bedford relies on its dominant position in the commercial fishing industry, and has been home to the nation’s top grossing port for nearly two decades. Tourism plays a complementary role, drawing on the rich maritime history of the port of New Bedford.
But beyond New Bedford’s fishing and tourist industries, there’s another economic sector in the region that’s garnering attention and positioning New Bedford to evolve economically yet again: clean energy development.
In recent years, New Bedford, under the leadership of Mayor Jon Mitchell, has emerged as a regional and national leader for photovoltaic solar power — which uses thin, flat panels to capture the sun’s light and convert photons into electricity. According to a report by the public interest research group Environment Massachusetts, as of the end of 2013, New Bedford was second only to New York City in cumulative installed solar photovoltaic capacity (in megawatts) and first in the continental United States on a per-capita basis.
True to trend, by the end of 2015, New Bedford — in partnership with Blue Wave Capital, Con Edison Solutions, and SunEdison — had installed 16 MW of solar capacity across the city, and is predicting savings of $22 million in energy costs over the next 20 years.
Importantly, photovoltaic solar power has become a more affordable source of electricity for many residents and business owners in recent years, and the cost for the clean energy source is continuing to decline. New Bedford city offices are taking advantage of these energy savings to bring affordable, clean energy to residents all over town.
A Leader in Residential Clean Energy Programs
The City of New Bedford has also taken steps to increase residential access to solar energy. Using stimulus money in 2010, then-Mayor Scott Lang created a municipal energy office to oversee energy efficiency and renewable energy programs not just for the City of New Bedford, but for city residents and small businesses as well. In 2011, the energy office announced its solar initiative, providing ample solar-powered electricity to municipal facilities, and then expanding to the residential and commercial sectors. Mayor Mitchell later elevated and empowered the Energy Office with permanent funding to be in a better position to execute the city’s ambitious clean energy efforts.
For the residential sector, the energy office began with a focus on bringing energy efficiency and weatherization services to the community, particularly families who fell through eligibility cracks for existing weatherization programs (families making 60 to 120 percent of median state income in 2009, which equaled roughly $38,400 to $76,800 annually per household).
Under the energy office, New Bedford partnered with local community organizations and launched the Community Mobilization Initiative, a collaboration among utilities, gas companies, and the Massachusetts Department of Energy Resources. The Community Mobilization Initiative combined efforts of local utilities, non-profits, and community service organizations to bring energy efficiency measures to New Bedford households, helping residents save money on utilities and use less energy. The program employed local workers to perform energy audits on homes and provide weatherization services, creating green jobs in a town suffering from unemployment rates in the teens.
Eventually, the energy efficiency work of the Community Mobilization Initiative was merged with the City’s Solar Initiative to become New Bedford Energy Now (NBEN), a residential one-stop-shop for all things energy. NBEN is comprised of three programs which address both the demand and supply side of New Bedford’s residential energy needs: New Bedford Efficiency Now, New Bedford Solar Now, and New Bedford Aggregation Now.
Energy Director Scott Durkee suggests that these programs, and primarily the energy efficiency work performed on local homes, helped bring the concept of “energy efficiency” to the residential vocabulary. To Durkee’s credit, his office’s engagement has helped residents and business owners reap the economic benefits of using cleaner and less energy.
Solar for the People
New Bedford Solar Now has helped homeowners and small businesses purchase rooftop solar systems through an aggregate purchasing structure which allows residents to achieve discounts based on volume. As residents have received their rebate checks from the services, they have also saved, on average, 24.5 percent on their energy bills, according to Durkee. As of June 2016, more than 400 rooftop systems had been installed on residences and small businesses in New Bedford, 132 of which were installed specifically through NBEN.
Currently, residents who received solar through the NBEN program are saving an aggregate of $64,000 a year.
I spoke with one New Bedford resident, Nancy Ramos, about her experiences with rooftop solar. Nancy and her family had a roof-top system installed in 2015, after her brother-in-law recommended the services of SolarNow to her family. She heard it would save them money on electricity bills, which was critical to her, as the house relies on electric heat and stove.
So far, the investment has paid off. The family got a rebate check when they first signed up, and get tax rebates for the first two years of service. Every few months, Nancy says, she receives a Solar Renewable Energy Credit, or SREC, payment based on the amount of electricity her system generated for that time period, and her last check exceeded $200. Shortly after the Ramos’s had their rooftop system installed, Nancy noticed three homes in her neighborhood installing systems. And since then, she has observed, rooftop panels have been popping up everywhere in the city.
NBEN is now looking to bring the savings from solar energy to all residents of New Bedford — especially those who can not put solar on their roofs, and the low to moderate-income neighborhoods where the cost of solar ownership is too high.
It is these communities that NBEN wants to reach with energy savings. However, the current solar systems are often not affordable or accessible to low to moderate-income residents, and NBEN is working to change that. Currently, rooftop solar is usually not an option for residents renting an apartment or house — meaning that residents who rent are locked out from potential energy savings. For some, even with the cost of solar declining, it is still too expensive to install.
As NBEN works with companies to find a solution that better meets the needs of economically diverse communities, the city is reaching out to people through community organizations, farmers markets, city hall, and other community events to encourage residents to consider a new option NBEN is developing: a community solar farm. Similar to an agricultural cooperative, the solar farm would allow people to purchase shares of solar energy generated from a large solar panel array. Residents who participate will be able to get financial benefits of solar without having to own physical rooftop systems.
New Bedford residents will undoubtedly see more rooftop panels popping up all over town as NBEN and the city continue to develop ways to bring clean, affordable energy to the whole city. While New Bedford is unique in its success thus far, it is not unique in its potential to bring clean energy to all corners of its community. By examining New Bedford’s success in promoting rooftop solar, other cities facing similar economic challenges can also work toward creative ways to bring affordable, clean energy to all of their residents.
Myriam Alexander-Kearns (@myrakearns) is the Research Associate for the Energy Policy team at the Center for American Progress.
