Solarize Westchester: Almost 400 homeowners, businesses go solar
About 400 homeowners and commercial property owners are going solar through Solarize Westchester, the program’s management announced last week.
Solarize Westchester is a program of Energize NY, a Yorktown Heights-based group that offers a number of programs aimed at helping home and business owners make energy decisions.
Solarize Westchester ran a total of 8, 20-week campaigns in 16 municipalities that help inform and accelerate the process of installing solar. The residential portion of campaigns in Hastings-on-Hudson, Dobbs Ferry, Tarrytown, Somers, New Castle and Rye Brook ended last week, while the commercial portion of those campaigns will conclude at the end of April.
The new solar contracts represent more than 3.3 megawatts of solar power capacity and will produce over 3.7 million kilowatt hours per year of renewable energy, Solarize Westchester said. The new contracts represent an average 190 percent increase compared to solar energy systems installed during the prior 12 years in the same communities.
The program also ran campaigns in Bedford, Mt Kisco, Cortlandt, Croton-on-Hudson, Larchmont,Mamaroneck, Ossining and Briarcliff Manor that ended in June 2015.
“There is clearly strong demand in Westchester County for the low-cost clean energy that solar installations provide,” said Nina Orville, program manager of Solarize Westchester.
Solarize Westchester is supported by the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority under NY-Sun, a billion-dollar initiative pushed by Gov. Andrew Cuomo to drive an increase in solar energy.
Commercial property owners in Hastings-on-Hudson,Dobbs Ferry, Tarrytown, Somers, New Castle and Rye Brook have until April 30 to sign contracts for solar systems. More information is available at SolarizeWestchester.com and Energize NY Finance.