Hosted by Travis Bradford

Guest Speaker: James J. Greenberger

Where: 1420 North Lake Shore Drive, Chicago Illinois
When: Tuesday, August 4, 2009 at 5:30pm
Cost: $75

Illinois has taken a major step forward in making the state a signature market for solar power.  On May 19th, Senate Bill 2150 was unanimously passes by the House and Senate, and is awaiting Governor Quinn's signature to be enacted into law.  SB 2150 amends the Electric Service Customer Choice and Rate Relief Law of 1997 in the Public Utilities Act.  The two issues of most relevance to the solar community is the establishment of 6% of the portion of electricity that must come from renewable energy sources, must come from solar power.  This 6% does not take effect until 2015, but will send a signal to the global solar industry that Illinois, 4th largest electricity user in the US, and consumer of 1% of the world's energy, is ready to take its place as a major market.  This can mean an installed solar capacity of 1,000 megawatts or more for Illinois in that year.

The other important provision is that alternative electric suppliers, outside of the service arms of the investor owned utilities, are now required to have the same percentages of their electricity come from renewable sources, which will be 2.5% after June 30, 2009.  Observers expect that this legislation will be augmented in future sessions to include a near term ramp up schedule and possibly the inclusion of other small-scale renewable electricity sources such as solar thermal and wind power systems under 100 or 50 kilowatts of capacity.  Senate Bill was oriiginally sponsored by State Senator Don Harmon of Oak Park (D-39), with bi-partisan sponsorships from both legislative bodies.  For more information on this and related actions, contact Jeremy Jones of ISEA's Policy Committee at jjones@socoreenergy.com.