Mixing trainees, including those formerly incarcerated, with installers and student volunteers helps promote social and environmental justice, as well as solar energy.
Once completed, the system will free up the homeowner — who is on a fixed income — from at least 90 percent of her electric bill. It will also produce clean energy without burning fossil fuels, thereby reducing smog emissions as well as greenhouse gases that contribute to global warming.
The group [GRID Alternatives], born in Northern California but with its largest office in downtown Los Angeles, drafted 200 students from 19 schools who are trading beaches for rooftops this spring.
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) engineering students trekked from the east coast to Pasadena this week to spend their spring break installing no-cost rooftop solar panel systems on local homes.
GRID Alternatives’ unique workforce development model utilizes multifamily solar construction projects like this one as “classrooms on the roof” where community members interested in careers in solar construction get skills to increase their chances of being hired in the booming industry.
The solar photovoltaic system, which adds a significant source of new, clean power to the area’s electrical grid, benefits an important local nonprofit providing housing during a countywide shortage.
GRID Alternatives Greater Los Angeles, the largest solar nonprofit in Southern California, announced today that it would construct multiple solar arrays in March on one of Community Corporation of Santa Monica’s Broadway properties serving low-income residents.
"It throws a wrench into plans that we had and into an industry that is really trying to address climate change," said Michael Kadish, executive director of Grid Alternatives in greater Los Angeles.
"In the grand scheme of things a 30% tariff on panels is a small percentage of the overall system cost, and solar still has a really nice value proposition despite that."