New Ally Joins Fight to Defend Rooftop Solar in California

O SOLAR MIO - A leading U.S. green group on Tuesday joined the legal challenge to a California rule banning solar contractors from installing or maintaining photovoltaic battery storage.

The Arizona-based Center for Biological Diversity (CBD) joined an amended lawsuit filed in San Diego County Superior Court against a California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) regulation enacted last year in accordance with the wishes of Pacific Gas & Electric and two other investor-owned utilities.

The amended lawsuit supplements a complaint filed by CalPIRG, the Solar Rights Alliance, the California Solar & Storage Association, and a solar contractor adversely affected by the new CPUC rule. Climate campaigners and Democratic state lawmakers have previously launched challenges to the regulation.

CBD said the new rule "would increase the cost and administrative burden of installing rooftop solar and storage, vital technologies that make communities more resilient to utility blackouts and the fossil fuel-driven climate emergency."

Roger Lin, a CBD senior attorney, said in a statement: "It's outrageous that California regulators keep attacking rooftop solar and it has to stop. They're undermining California's climate goals and putting clean energy further out of reach for working-class families."

"This licensing trick is straight from the utility playbook and will cause electricity rates to skyrocket while worsening the climate emergency," Lin added. "People are dying from extreme heat and California desperately needs smart, resilient energy solutions. Instead, the board is propping up a brittle electricity grid that devastates critical habitats and promotes environmental injustice."

The new suit came on the same day that the California Energy Commission (CEC) announced nearly $19 million in new grants meant to assist communities in their efforts to automate the approval of residential solar energy permits.

"We are thrilled to be able to disburse funds to over 330 cities and counties across California to make it easier for residents to go solar," CEC Chair David Hochschild said in a statement, calling the program "a win for residents, building departments, solar businesses, and our environment."

(Brett Wilkins is a staff writer for Common Dreams where this article was first featured.)