HERE COMES THE SUN !
Here Comes the Sun: a new era of solar energy is here By Janice Valverde 4/24/2015 Spring is here. Massachusetts' winter-without-mercy is history. As exciting as it is to see the buds popping and the birds nesting, there is another phenomenon so exciting that it marks not only a welcome new season, but a long-awaited new era. It's finally the age of solar power. There are so many reasons to say, “Here comes the sun!” Here are just a few recent developments in the solar power sector show that Eastern Massachusetts is clearly a leader in the United States' transition to this new era.
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President Obama announced April 3 that the Energy Department wants to train 75,000 people for the solar workforce by 2020, increasing a goal set in May 2014 by 25,000. Many of these workers may end up in Massachusetts, already second in the nation in solar industry employment, according to the Solar Foundation.
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IKEA's Stoughton store, 30 miles south of Boston, demonstrates the company's commitment to invest $1.8 billion in renewable energy. It announced April 16 that it has installed 1,248 atop the store. They will provide 318 kilowatts of electricity.
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About 35 miles north of Boston, Amesbury Mayor Ken Gray announced this month in his "state of the city" report that the town will host a solar farm on the site of a former landfill. "It will be a $10 million private investment, a 6 megawatt array, one of the largest in the Northeast United States," he said.
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Amesbury's neighbor, Salisbury, boasts "the largest Solar Park in New England." True North Energy built the park, which generates 5.7 megawatts of power, used by local municipalities and school districts.
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Next Step Living, a Boston company that brings energy efficiency and solar power to New England homeowners, is growing like crazy, hiring so many people this spring that it will have ten times as many staff as it started with in 2008. It held a "hiring event" April 15 at its HQs in the Innovation District in South Boston.
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On Hancock Street in Quincy, MA, every other lamp post sports a bright yellow banner that says "SOLARIZE QUINCY." The city was selected to be a 2015 participant in a statewide initiative that has already facilitated over 16 megawatts of solar energy systems on 2,400 properties since 2011.
The list could go on and on. As a Massachusetts resident, I'm proud that my home state is a leader in solar power. As an Earthling, I'm relieved and reassured that we are finally looking in the right direction for our energy. After all, humans have been looking (and digging) in the wrong direction for over a hundred years in their search for sources of electric power. Isn't the sun our greatest natural resource? Isn't it the safest and sanest and most natural source for generating power? Not to be overly simplistic, but hasn't the sun been providing light and warmth for a very long time? Maybe harnessing that power just makes a lot more sense than splitting atoms or burning coal! Consider these questions: •
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Will solar power threaten us with the unthinkable possibility of coal ash spills like the one that destroyed hundreds of acres in Kingston, Tennessee when tons of toxic coal ash broke through a dam? Does the sun emit carbon dioxide that pollutes the air, unnaturally warms the Earth's atmosphere and presents numerous health hazards to humans? Will the sun generate tons of radioactive waste like that must be stored indefinitely at over 125 U.S. nuclear reactor sites, presenting a potential hazard to humanity for the next million years or so?
The answers to these questions are "No, no, and hell no." And I say, Here Comes the Sun.