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Commendation Honoring Ann Arbor Solar Club Participants
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WHEREAS in December 2012, with the passage (by the Ann Arbor City Council) of the Climate Action Plan (CAP) <http://www.a2gov.org/departments/systems-planning/energy/Documents/CityofAnnArborClimateActionPlan_low%20res_12_17_12.pdf>, the City of Ann Arbor committed to an ambitious multi-strategy vision to address Climate Change by reducing its community-wide greenhouse emissions (8% by 2015, 25% by 2025, and 90% by 2050 - relative to year 2000 baseline carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e) emissions levels);
WHEREAS the Energy Commission’s CAP Solar Goals (24 MW of new solar installations by 2025 at a rate of 2.4 MW/year) were acknowledged by the Ann Arbor City Council in their June 2016 Resolution Authorizing a Commitment to Making the City of Ann Arbor a Solar Ready Community;
WHEREAS, City Council unanimously reaffirmed local commitment to climate action in Resolution R-17-238 (“Resolution Committing the City of Ann Arbor to Adopt, Honor and Uphold Paris Climate Agreement Goals”);
WHEREAS the City of Ann Arbor’s contractor, the Clean Energy Coalition (CEC), launched a Solar Club, in partnership with Geostellar - a West Virginia based company - to encourage local citizens to install solar energy, commensurate with the CAP solar goals;
WHEREAS in its first year of operation Geostellar ran into significant problems launching the Solar Club program and fulfilling their outstanding solar commitments to citizens that had purchased solar arrays under the program;
WHEREAS, Geostellar’s fulfillment problem has impacted local solar businesses, the Ann Arbor Energy Office and CEC, affected local citizens financially, and slowed Ann Arbor's efforts to meet its Climate Action Plan;
WHEREAS the local solar companies that were directly involved and/or indirectly affected by the Geostellar fulfillment problems, Ann Arbor Energy Office and CEC were not in any way responsible and continued to do their solar jobs in spite of the Geostellar fulfillment problem;
WHEREAS in December 2017 both Oak Electric and Michigan Solar Solutions went the extra mile - at their own expense - to fix this Geostellar fulfillment problem by assuming the responsibility of making sure Ann Arbor homeowners who paid for solar panels through Geostellar’s Solar Club program received their promised arrays or were otherwise made whole;
WHEREAS, fostering trust and faith in our local solar small businesses, the Energy Office and Ann Arbor’s Climate Action Plan-related solar initiatives is paramount to the success of the city to honor and uphold Paris Climate Agreement Goals;
RESOLVED that the Ann Arbor Energy Commission wishes to acknowledge the Energy Office, CEC , Oak Electric and Michigan Solar Solutions for their efforts to maintain the integrity of the Ann Arbor Solar Club in spite of Geostellar’s fulfillment problems and their related efforts to ensure that Ann Arbor homeowners who paid for solar panels through Geostellar’s program received their promised arrays or were otherwise made whole.