What Would Consumers Choose? (Solar. They Would Choose Solar.)

By Frank Andorka, Senior Correspondent

What Happened: Sunrun has produced a consumer-friendly report called Affordable, Clean, Reliable Energy, which asks the ever important question: What would consumers choose for their own electrical production?

• In a delightfully readable format, Sunrun’s CEO Lynn Jurich posits that given a choice between a distributed-generation, renewable-energy based electrical system and the traditional fossil-fuel based one, consumers would choose the former.
• She also forcefully lays out the case for solar as a job generator and calls for an end to the “war on solar” (now there’s a woman who knows how to use catchy slogans).
• Lastly, Jurich argues in favor of removing the state-sponsored monopoly status from most utilities and letting the market decide what the best future for the U.S. electrical grid is. (You go, Lynn!)

SolarWakeup’s View:  More of this, please.

Poll after poll after poll indicates that American consumers, by and large, prefer solar electricity. The most famous poll of all showed the number approaching 90%. So why have we failed so spectacularly to rally those throngs of solar-loving Americans behind policies that would help maintain and expand the industry beyond where it is now?

I have a theory, and it has to do with the technical nature of our industry.

It’s easy to get excited about efficiency ratios, inverter harmonics and other deeply technical issues, and they are interesting to most people within the industry. But most American consumers are like me – the engineering aspects of solar, while interesting, wouldn’t be enough to get me off my couch and to a pro-solar rally.

That’s why Sunrun CEO Lynn Jurich’s new 32-page advocacy piece, Affordable, Clean, Reliable Energy is such a refreshing change from the typical pro-solar article. Jurich’s clear, concise article hits on two of the most compelling arguments for why consumers should – and do – choose solar energy:

• Solar is a job generator.
• Solar allows consumers to seize control of their own electric future.

Jurich also issues a challenge to utilities who, in many cases, seem scared to compete against solar: Let the free market decide. Remove the state-sponsored monopoly status that most utilities enjoy across the country and give consumers the choice of what kind of electrical future they want. Would they want a decentralized/cleaner/cheaper electricity-generation system;; or rebuilt 19th century centralized/dirty/fossil based one. Jurich bets they would choose the former.

It’s a message that more solar companies must do a much better job of proclaiming every day – and I thank Jurich for at least giving it a good start.

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