Ohio clean energy projects under an Inflation Reduction Act grant announced last month show how solar sited on closed landfills can reduce greenhouse gases, improve resilience and provide funding for other environmental goals.

Part of the $129.4 million grant from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency will add 28 megawatts of solar generation to a county central services facility and four former landfill sites in Cleveland and Cuyahoga County. A bigger chunk of the funding will bring 35 MW of solar and 10 MW of battery storage to a brownfield site in Painesville in Lake County, which will let the city close a coal-fired peaker plant that dates back to 1908.

Representatives of the Cleveland, Painesville and Cuyahoga County governments, along with the EPA and others, met July 26 at Cuyahoga County’s 4 MW solar array in Brooklyn, Ohio, to discuss the grant and the work. Funding from the EPA grant will more than double the generation capacity of that landfill solar site, which has been in operation since 2018.

“In Northeast Ohio we’re going to see warmer, wetter, wilder weather in this region. And we have to do our part to address climate change,” said Mike Foley, director of sustainability for Cuyahoga County.

Funded projects under the grant are expected to eliminate the equivalent of 1 million metric tons of carbon dioxide over a 25-year period, with the largest cuts coming from deploying the solar projects in Cuyahoga County, Cleveland and Painesville, according to Valerie Katz, deputy director of sustainability for Cuyahoga County. 

The biggest chunk of grant money will go to Painesville, which is in Lake County east of Cleveland. But the 28 MW of solar generation to be built in Cuyahoga County will have a big impact.

“This will triple our solar capacity in Cuyahoga County in the next five years,” Katz said.

The landfill and brownfield projects funded by the grant will do more than produce electricity. By avoiding pollution from fossil fuels, they’ll provide health and environmental benefits. They’ll also produce revenue.

Some of the revenue from the brownfield solar site in Painesville will fund natural habitat for pollinators, birds and other wildlife elsewhere on that site. The city plans to work with the West Creek Conservancy for that and other projects, including building public trails and creating access for fishing.

Cuyahoga County also plans to use revenue from its sites to deploy more solar, Katz said. The added solar, in turn, can help develop microgrids to boost resiliency.

Making landfill solar work

While closed landfills provide plenty of open space, they also are often capped by membranes made from clay or other materials that cannot be damaged without risking environmental harm.

Solar arrays at these sites are feasible thanks to ballast systems, which have been fairly common for such uses for more than a decade. Huge concrete blocks anchor the solar array’s racks and panels. The blocks, or ballasts, support the array and protect it from wind. 

“They’re not going through the cap, which works out great for us,” said Jarnal Singh, an environmental supervisor with Ohio EPA’s Twinsburg office in its division of materials and waste management.

Without holes in the cap, the solar array doesn’t provide a pathway for methane or other gases to escape from the landfill. Leaving the cap intact also avoids creating a pathway for water to get in and percolate through the waste. That liquid, called leachate, could pollute groundwater if it’s not collected and treated properly.

Ohio has 141 landfill sites that have been subject to the state’s post-closure care requirements, according to Anthony Chenault, the Ohio EPA’s media coordinator for its Central, Northeast and Southeast districts. The agency has approved four landfills for solar development so far and has had informal discussions about several more sites.

But other practical considerations and site-specific features control whether any particular landfill is suitable for solar development.

“Some factors that could determine viability of a solar installation include proximity to existing power lines, size of the landfill, condition of the landfill cover, ownership (public vs private), and accessibility for equipment and maintenance,” Chenault said via email.

A few years should have passed since a landfill was closed and capped, so some settlement and off-gassing has already taken place, said Scott Ameduri, president of Enerlogics Networks, which was the primary developer for the Cuyahoga County solar site. There also must be a financially sound owner willing to accept responsibility for the waste at the site, he said.

Just as importantly, the electricity will need somewhere to go and a way to get there.

“In Brooklyn, for example, we were fortunate that Cleveland Public Power is a municipal utility,” Ameduri said. Municipal utilities are generally more flexible about making arrangements to take and distribute power than investor-owned utilities, he noted. Community solar legislation, such as House Bill 197, could help change things on that front, he added.

Another option is to have a large off-taker for the electricity adjacent to or near the landfill. The 7 MW of new grant-funded solar power to be built on a landfill south of the IX Center in Cuyahoga County can go to the expo center or the nearby Cleveland Hopkins International Airport, Ameduri said. The general area is also under consideration for one of the Cuyahoga County utility’s microgrids.

Otherwise, a landfill solar project putting electricity onto the grid may require a go-ahead from the regional grid operator, which is PJM for Ohio. The process takes roughly three to five years and adds extra costs. “I’d rather spread that over a 100-MW project than I would for a smaller brownfield site,” Ameduri said.

For now, Cleveland, Painesville and Cuyahoga County are celebrating the EPA grant award.

“This investment will allow us right here in Cleveland to turn brownfields into bright fields,” said Mayor Justin Bibb.

Inflation Reduction Act grant gives landfill solar a boost in Ohio is an article from Energy News Network, a nonprofit news service covering the clean energy transition. If you would like to support us please make a donation.

The Port of Cleveland is going electric.

One of the Great Lakes’ largest shipping ports is transforming part of a large warehouse into an “electrification hub” to anchor its emission-cutting efforts in the coming decades.

The project is among the Cleveland-Cuyahoga Port Authority’s first steps toward its goal of net-zero emissions for its own operations by 2050. The target does not include “Scope 3” emissions from the ships, trains, and trucks that come and go from the port, but officials hope the upgrades will support their emissions cuts as well.

“Upgrading the electric feed into the terminal is not the most exciting thing,” said Carly Beck, the port’s senior manager for planning, environment and information systems, but it’s a necessary foundation for all other parts of the port authority’s climate plan. 

Shipping ports are a major source of not only climate emissions but also harmful air pollution for nearby communities. Fossil fuels power most of the cranes, vehicles, and other equipment used to move commodities and consumer goods around the globe. The United Nations estimates that global shipping is responsible for about 3% of emissions worldwide.

The Cleveland-Cuyahoga County Port Authority became the first port on the Great Lakes to announce a net-zero emissions goal when its board unanimously approved its climate action plan last September. In February, the board approved spending $32 million from state and federal transportation grants to modernize the warehouse and make electrification upgrades. 

Cleveland’s downtown port on Lake Erie handles about 13 million tons of cargo each year, from steel and iron ore to wind turbine parts and heavy machinery. Most goes to or comes from parts of Ohio and neighboring states via rail or truck.

“Lake Erie … sits at a very important position geographically as part of the Great Lakes,” said Dana Rodriguez, a senior analyst on global shipping at the Environmental Defense Fund. 

The Cleveland-Cuyahoga County Port Authority, like many of its U.S. counterparts, is a public entity that owns and maintains infrastructure at the port. It contracts with a commercial operating company, Logistec, to run day-to-day operations.

The port considered multiple approaches for cutting greenhouse gas emissions, including hydrogen power, before deciding to focus its efforts on electrification, Beck said. All told, the port estimates full electrification will require roughly 5 to 7 megawatts of available power, she said. Design work for modernization and the electrification hub at the port’s Warehouse A is underway. 

The port also is working with Logistec on a grant application for funds under the U.S. EPA’s Clean Ports Program, set up under the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act. Roughly $2.8 billion in competitive grants are available for deploying zero-emission technology, with an additional $150 million for climate and air quality planning. The application is due May 28. 

If successful, the port plans to add 2 megawatts of solar capacity on top of Warehouse A, which will provide a significant chunk of its anticipated electrical needs. Other funds would be used to start acquiring electric equipment for port operations, such as a large forklift.

Over time, the port plans to acquire additional equipment as and when machinery and funds become available, including replacements for a large crane and other material-handling equipment. 

“It’s just a matter now of biting off chunks as we can,” Beck said.  Timing for the acquisitions will also depend on when different types of electrical equipment become available, which will involve ongoing review.

Port Authority President and CEO Will Friedman said the electrification push fits with the port’s broader sustainability goals, including reducing water pollution in Lake Erie and managing dredged material more sustainably.

“We’re doing it because it’s the right thing to do. We have a social conscience here,” Friedman said.

The decision also should help the port stay competitive, especially as more companies consider the indirect emissions of their contractors. 

“We think that’s going to be the future if you’re part of the supply chain network,” Friedman said, adding that ignoring greenhouse gas emissions really isn’t an option. “All industries are trying to figure out how they can decarbonize, and maritime shipping is certainly a part of that.” 

The bigger picture

Decarbonization makes sense for Cleveland and Cuyahoga County in the global scheme of things, said Grant Goodrich, executive director for the Great Lakes Energy Institute at Case Western Reserve University.

“Getting products in and out of Europe and being able to advertise and market that you can do it in a more emissions-friendly manner gives you a competitive advantage,” Goodrich said. The European Union already is pushing for the shipping sector to cut greenhouse gas emissions, and Goodrich expects that will ultimately become important in the American marketplace as well. Cutting greenhouse gases also could help attract more cruise ship business to Cleveland, he added.

The port’s regional nature likely will make some aspects of decarbonization easier. For starters, the port generally does not store fuel for ships on site. Ships typically fill up elsewhere, often from barges, depending on where they believe they can get the best deal, Friedman said. If a ship does need extra fuel while in Cleveland, trucks deliver it.

On the other hand, the Cleveland-Cuyahoga County Port Authority has less bargaining power than some much larger ports on the East and West coasts. That limits its ability to increase fees, which makes grants and other types of funding particularly important.

The Cleveland-Cuyahoga Port Authority’s focus on Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions is consistent with the goals for a majority of other ports included in a March 2024 report from the Environmental Defense Fund and Arup. However, the report noted, the majority of total port emissions driving human-caused climate change generally are not within ports’ direct control and would fall into Scope 3. 

“Action in the broader zone of user and community and industry influence, where impacts are often far greater and where potential benefits are significant, is lacking,” the EDF report said.

The Cleveland-Cuyahoga County Port Authority’s upgrades include planning to provide power for some of those other indirect emissions.

“We don’t want to forget about Scope 3,” Beck said.

She added that the port anticipates offering incentives to encourage ships and others to reduce their emissions.

An example would be for ships to plug into electrical shore power, known as “cold ironing,” instead of running diesel engines while in port. Besides cutting greenhouse gas emissions, the process can also reduce pollution from particulate matter, nitrous oxides, hydrocarbons and carbon monoxide. The port also hopes to encourage independent operators to acquire electric tugboats and similar equipment.

“Port decarbonization is just one key piece of the full decarbonization equation,” said Rodriguez at the Environmental Defense Fund. “It is also up to the trucking and shipping sectors to meet the ports halfway and contribute to the decarbonization efforts. In an effort to reach net zero by 2050, all stakeholders must play their part.”

Cleveland port’s ‘electrification hub’ expected to anchor progress toward net-zero emissions is an article from Energy News Network, a nonprofit news service covering the clean energy transition. If you would like to support us please make a donation.

Companies have a smoother road for getting management to greenlight clean energy projects now than they did five years ago, thanks to corporate climate commitments, federal incentives and more.

And if last month’s turnout of more than 800 people for the Greater Cleveland Partnership’s sustainability summit is any guide, businesses want support and guidance on navigating a process that is more compelling yet also more complex than it was years ago. The Jan. 23 program drew twice as many attendees as last year’s inaugural event.

Sustainability “is a major market trend at this point. It’s a massive market opportunity,” said Baiju Shah, president and chief executive officer for the Greater Cleveland Partnership, which is one of the United States’ largest metropolitan chambers of commerce. At the same time, sustainability is crucial if businesses want to stay competitive in a global marketplace, he said.

Roughly a third of the Greater Cleveland Partnership’s largest member companies have pledged to be carbon neutral by 2050, according to Emily Keller, GCP’s manager of sustainability initiatives. And, she added, practically all member companies have committed to some environmental sustainability practices.

Those pledges and goals have an impact when it comes to getting the green light for clean energy projects, especially when companies report on their progress towards environmental, social and governance objectives.

“Explaining an energy efficiency project [to management] or even being able to get a renewable energy project across the finish line five years ago was much different than what it is today,” said Rebecca Karason, the environment and sustainability director for Huntington National Bank. Decisions on three solar arrays for the company were based on economic factors, but a good part of the decision also hinged on the company’s renewable energy commitment, she said.

Ideally, clean energy projects add to businesses’ bottom lines.

“At its core, the development and the analysis of these projects is no different than any other capital project, but it is a complicated process,” said Gino Scipione, whose practice with Cohen & Company centers on compliance and financial reporting.

For any project, “you have to be able to prove at its core that it’s going to return value,” Scipione said. Most projects are capital expenditures, so for accounting purposes they get capitalized and depreciated over time, instead of being treated as an expense for a single year. How much comes from equity versus debt financing affects the calculations, too.

Beyond the general tax considerations that enter into any business deal, companies should also consider if a project can qualify for tax credits under the Inflation Reduction Act’s clean energy incentives, Scipione noted. Those reductions in tax liability reduce the total cost for a project. And larger tax credits are available if projects are located in disinvested or energy communities and satisfy other requirements. In some cases, there also may be an opportunity to sell renewable energy credits, or RECs, which can provide income to further offset costs.

All of that, for example, means a company can see savings sooner from an investment in solar energy compared to the costs of otherwise purchasing electricity from the grid.

“The amount of money that I’ve seen in the last two years coming from the federal government is really helping,” said Rishabh Bahel, Nestlé’s manager of energy and sustainability for North America, who is based in Solon, Ohio. The company has announced it plans to power all its operations sites with renewable electricity by 2025, and one of its strategies has been investing in solar farms.

If a project meets enough requirements for the Inflation Reduction Act’s tax credits, “essentially you can get 40 to 50% paid by the government,” Bahel said. “So you have to make sure you’re looking at all the incentives and plans available in the market.”

Energy efficiency is another big emphasis for Nestlé.

“Any time you’re saving energy, you’re saving money,” Bahel said.

Those energy savings cut the costs of production and support the business case for the investment. In contrast, if companies merely pay for carbon offsets, “that really doesn’t have any payback,” he said.

Businesses in disinvested neighborhoods also need the economics of clean energy projects to work, because a company with too much debt won’t succeed, said Michael Jeans, CEO of Growth Opportunity Partners and its GO Green Energy Fund. He and others at Growth Opps often guide companies through the financing process and provide advice to help them make projects succeed.

Transparency and reporting

Even as financial incentives boost the business case for clean energy investments, companies also face added compliance requirements for reporting greenhouse gas emissions.

“It’s sort of a carrot and stick,” said Kaitlin Bergan, head of sustainable client solutions for BlackRock’s U.S., Canadian and Latin American team, as she reported on overall trends in industry.

In 2022, the Securities and Exchange Commission issued proposed rules for publicly traded companies to report on climate risks and their contributions to greenhouse gas emissions. The rule will likely be finalized sometime this spring. The European Union already has adopted reporting requirements for some companies. And as Karason sees it, reporting requirements will trickle down even to smaller companies.

Reporting requirements can be a challenge, especially if different customers need data reported in different formats, said attorney Richik Sarkar, Dinsmore & Shohl’s ESG equity partner in Cleveland. Yet as sustainability managers do that, he suggested they also should think about how to explain projects to their companies’ financial officers.

So, Sarkar challenged: “How do you make the business case and explain to them it’s not only a matter of doing good, but it’s a matter of doing well?” 

To be sure, not all companies are moving ahead on clean energy projects. About 50 attendees walked out during Bergan’s talk, as a protest against BlackRock’s continuing investments in fossil fuels. And last week, FirstEnergy reneged on its commitment to reduce greenhouse gas emissions 30% by 2030. 

Craig Ickler is an energy democracy organizer for Cleveland Owns, which was among the groups organizing the protest. With BlackRock being an exception, Ickler felt the Greater Cleveland Partnership is “talking about sustainability seriously.” He also wants more involvement of local neighborhoods in energy projects and decisions. “My focus is as much on removing fossil fuels from the energy equation as it is about who’s going to own those clean energy assets and who’s going to benefit from them,” he said.

Emily Bacha, vice president of public affairs for the Ohio Environmental Council, also attended the Jan. 23 conference. She said she saw “real momentum to push forward equity in climate and sustainability strategies” — something she wouldn’t have expected ten years ago.

Now Bacha and others will be watching to see what further strides companies make. “It’s important that we’re not just talking the talk, but walking the walk across all sectors,” she said.

Cleveland summit spotlights growing corporate interest in clean energy projects is an article from Energy News Network, a nonprofit news service covering the clean energy transition. If you would like to support us please make a donation.

A Cleveland-area company hopes corporate and charitable sponsors will want to share a piece of the circular economy.

Canvus is counting on a sponsorship model to grow the market for the benches, picnic tables, and other outdoor furniture it makes from recycled wind turbine blades. The company started shipping its products in August and has installed more than 200 pieces so far in one of the latest attempts to recycle a growing wind industry waste stream.

Cumulative U.S. wind turbine blade waste is projected to exceed 2 million tons by mid-century — a relatively small amount compared to what’s churned out by fossil fuel industries. Still, several companies are working to reduce how much winds up in landfills.

Due to the size, weight and product cost, Canvus’s designs are best suited for places like parks, schools or other outdoor venues, said Brian Donahue, the company’s vice president for corporate affairs. But many cities, towns and schools are strapped for cash. So, Canvus’s business model emphasizes donors to help put its products in public spaces. Corporate sponsorships, nonprofit organizations or memorials pay for a majority of the products, which go to spots chosen by local communities.

Mark Wahlberg Chevrolet of Avon, Ohio, is among the early sponsors of a Canvus bench. 

“Our community supports us and our business. So it’s our way of putting back into our neighborhood and supporting the people around us,” said general manager Rick Limbers. Plus, “it’s a unique way of using the turbines.”

Plaques on each product identify the donor and provide a QR code. Each code links to a website that can be updated with whatever information the donor wants to feature. So a business might send viewers to its website, product specials or career information. A community group might list upcoming events or information about people being honored. Families can include slideshows and other tributes to loved ones. 

“Creating opportunities for individuals and businesses to give back to their communities is what drives us,” said Mike Crissman, Canvus’s brand communications manager. If the company has calculated right, those opportunities may also provide it with a sustainable business in a circular economy.

There are certainly lots of political subdivisions with public spaces — about 20,000 cities, villages, townships and counties within the United States, by Donahue’s reckoning, plus roughly 7,000 state and national parks. “And then, of course, 141,000 schools with spaces,” from kindergarten through trade schools and universities, he adds.

Canvus made a strategic decision to offer only 11 products, with limited style variations, allowing the company to annually make tens of thousands, depending on the blade supply, Donahue said. Each product comes in one of three colors that can blend in with a natural background, or else the furniture is primed and ready to paint by artists.

“In any given year, there’s like 5,000 to 8,000 [blades] that come down. So we had to go for scale,” he said. “And in order to do that, you can’t make super unique products that take forever to make.”

Scaled up, the Avon plant could process about 1,500 blades per year, Donahue said. Additional machinery could also be installed to process blades for other possible uses.

Focusing on a potential market matters for any company looking to innovate and offer a new product, said Rick Stockburger, president and CEO of BRITE Energy Innovators, a local clean energy business development hub that is not involved with Canvus. For its part, BRITE insists that the innovators it works with be able to show a market need for their products.

“The greatest science isn’t necessarily the greatest product,” Stockburger said. “If you’re not understanding markets and developing products that people want to buy at a price that makes you a profit, we’re never going to solve this clean energy transition and climate change.”

Beyond benches

The challenge of dealing with decommissioned wind blades will grow in future years. A 2021 analysis in the journal Resources, Conservation and Recovery estimates there will be between 10,000 and 20,000 blades coming down from turbines annually from 2027 through 2040.

Some doubt whether Canvus or other repurposing companies will make a significant dent in the disposal problem. “In general, there are a lot of similar repurposing concepts and efforts around,” said George Xydis, a professor at Aarhus University in Denmark and adjunct faculty member at Johns Hopkins University who has also worked in the wind industry. 

Other examples of wind turbine blade recycling include a Veolia North America plant in northeastern Missouri that basically shreds old turbine blades for use in cement kilns. The plant has processed more than 3,600 blades since it opened in 2020, according to Denise Kopko, the company’s senior vice president for environmental solutions and services.

“The pioneering solution we developed has evolved into a working business model by taking advantage of the scale and volume of decommissioned turbine blades and using the blade components as a replacement of raw material as well as an alternative fuel source for the manufacturing of cement,” Kopko said. “By replacing a percentage of fossil fuel demand in cement manufacturing, we are able to help the industry reduce its carbon footprint, while also helping the wind energy industry — and its message of green power — come full circle by keeping the end-of-life blades out of landfills and scattered stockpiles.”

Cement making is generally carbon intensive, because there’s both a need for high heat and because the chemical reactions to make cement release carbon dioxide. Kopko said Veolia’s product can reduce greenhouse gas emissions up to 27%.

Other companies aim to separate glass or polymers from wood and other parts of a blade, including Carbon Rivers and REGEN. The glass or polymers can then be used for other applications. A Danish company, Miljøskærm, shreds blades to extract fiberglass and then uses it to make highway noise barriers.

Yet more will be needed, according to Xydis, who co-authored a study on wind blade waste earlier this year in the journal Environmental Process & Sustainable Energy. The work “underscores the importance of developing technologies for full decomposition to ensure the long-term viability of the wind energy sector,” he said.

Vestas announced last February that it had come up with a way to break down epoxy resin from turbine blades into virgin-grade materials. And in 2022, the first Siemens Gamesa RecyclableBlade was installed at a German wind project.

For now, Canvus is working hard to promote its furniture business, while also exploring other products that could be made from parts of retired blades.

“Why destroy the blade?” Donahue asks. “It’s so strong. It’s so hard to destroy. Why can’t we look at it differently?”

Editor’s note: There is no relation between reporter Kathiann M. Kowalski and Canvus co-founder and managing director Parker Kowalski.

Spirit of giving is central to Cleveland-area company’s blades-to-benches business is an article from Energy News Network, a nonprofit news service covering the clean energy transition. If you would like to support us please make a donation.

The federal study calculated rooftop solar potential adjusted for roof slope, shadows, and other factors

Widespread deployment of rooftop solar in a 5.4-square-mile section of Cleveland could produce enough electricity to power approximately 10,000 homes, according to a new analysis by NASA researchers.

The study, which used aerial images to calculate rooftop solar capacity, found the potential for more than 100,000 megawatt hours of generation per year — 85% of which could be generated on a fifth of the buildings.

The findings could help inform the city’s strategy as it aims to achieve 100% renewable energy by 2050. Local leaders expressed interest in using NASA’s methods to assess solar potential across the entire county.

“It’s encouraging that we have that much potential in just our study area,” said Hannah Besso, project lead with NASA’s DEVELOP program.

Besso’s team selected the Northeast Ohio test area because it includes both residential and industrial buildings, as well as some buildings in Cleveland’s downtown area.

Almost two-thirds of the 560 buildings with the largest solar energy potential fell into the industrial and commercial categories. Institutional buildings made up roughly another fifth. Those types of buildings tend to have more surface area for solar panels, Besso said.

At the same time, the analysis doesn’t detract from the importance of solar energy for smaller residential buildings. “For a private homeowner, it’s still beneficial and important to reduce your individual energy bill,” Besso said.

Also, “a lot of the smaller residential homes actually could produce more potential solar energy per square foot,” Besso said. That’s because roofs on many residential buildings are more sloped than those on commercial or industrial buildings.

Advanced methods

Besso worked on the project with NASA DEVELOP team members Yiyi He, Crystal Wespestad and Sihang Chen in Tempe, Arizona. The group’s applied science work improves on previous ways to estimate solar energy potential from aerial or satellite data.

The group worked with high-resolution images from aircraft and from NASA’s Shuttle Radar Topography Mission, which collected data on nearly 80% of Earth’s land surfaces. The analysis also uses solar and meteorological data from NASA’s Prediction of Worldwide Energy Resources (POWER). The POWER data sets can account for aerosols, clouds and other atmospheric phenomena that can affect the solar energy potential for different locations.

The group adjusted the POWER data to account for roof slope, shadows and other factors. Data from that work came from LIDAR, a method that calculates measurements — in this case elevations — based on the time it takes reflected laser light to bounce back from a target point. All the data gave Besso’s group a digital surface model with a resolution of approximately one foot.

“We were really, really excited that we were able to get such good results,” given the project’s time frame and the newness of various methods, Besso said. “It’s also really wonderful to be working on research that will directly help a community increase quality of life and increase sustainability.”

Going further

“A lot of times people will maybe make an assumption that maybe solar isn’t something that can really work in someplace like Cleveland,” said Nicholas Rajkovich, an assistant professor at the University at Buffalo’s School of Architecture and Planning, who has consulted with Cleveland and Cuyahoga County on their sustainability work. “Something like this [the NASA DEVELOP analysis], where you get good data to see exactly what that energy resource is and where to target resources is really helpful.”

The Cuyahoga County Climate Change Action Plan, released on May 15, aims to achieve net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. The 2018 update to the Cleveland Climate Action Plan likewise committed to move to 100% renewable energy.

Local government leaders see clean energy as a tool for increasing resilience to climate change, along with providing economic opportunities, promoting better health, and striving for racial equity.

“Finding the first places to maybe do solar is pretty important,” Rajkovich said. Part of resilience planning involves assessing plans for their feasibility and gauging the potential impacts of different responses on a system. In this case, the NASA DEVELOP team’s work can help with targeted outreach to property owners whose buildings have significant solar energy potential.

The city and county’s work to promote solar energy contrasts sharply with policies at the state level, where the passage of House Bill 6 has made the state of Ohio “a laughingstock in terms of our laws around renewables,” Cuyahoga County Director of Sustainability Mike Foley said. “We just desperately need more tools and more resources available to develop clean energy.”

The NASA DEVELOP team didn’t make any assumptions about solar energy potential outside its 5.4 square-mile test area. However, the county plans to use the method to continue the analysis for the rest of the county’s 457 square miles, Foley said. Eventually, his department hopes to share information from the project with solar energy installers and developers in the area.

“I’m cautiously optimistic that this will be another kind of thing to help us move solar forward,” Foley said.

NASA analysis sheds light on Cleveland area’s rooftop solar potential is an article from Energy News Network, a nonprofit news service covering the clean energy transition. If you would like to support us please make a donation.