Inside Clean Energy: The Rooftop Solar Income Gap Is (Slowly) Shrinking
Research shows that falling costs are helping to make solar accessible to people with lower incomes.
April 15, 2021
Contractors install SunRun Inc. solar panels on the roof of a new home at the Westline Homes Willowood Cottages community in Sacramento, California, on Aug. 15, 2018. Credit: David Paul Morris/Bloomberg via Getty Images
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One of the most common arguments against subsidizing rooftop solar is that the benefits mostly go to affluent households that don’t need any help.
But the reality is that the declining costs of rooftop solar, along with access to solar leasing and other financing methods, are helping to reduce the income gap between solar households and U.S. households in general.
Let the Sunshine In, for the Benefit of All
Proven strategies can make solar power available to lower income people.
Low- and moderate-income households bear heavy housing and energy cost burdens. In the United States, people with low incomes spend about three times more of their income on energy than those with higher incomes.
Moreover, these households are much less likely to reap the benefits of converting to solar power. But now, a study from the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory has identified three approaches that effectively expand the availability of rooftop solar to people in lower income brackets.
Energy, housing, health, and education systems; and âsystems that encourage or discourage environmental degradationâ all âtouch racial justice. So in order to start breaking down racial disparities in solar, I think we need to broaden our lens.â
By Galen Barbose, Eric O’Shaughnessy and Ryan Wiser, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory
Until recently, rooftop solar panels were a clean energy technology that only wealthy Americans could afford. But prices have dropped, thanks mostly to falling costs for hardware, as well as price declines for installation and other “soft” costs.
Today hundreds of thousands of middle-class households across the U.S. are turning to solar power. But households with incomes below the median for their areas remain less likely to go solar. These low- and moderate-income households face several roadblocks to solar adoption, including cash constraints, low rates of home ownership and language barriers.
Cheaper solar power means low-income families can also benefit – with the right kind of help yahoo.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from yahoo.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.