Austin City Council passes resolution to work toward installing solar systems on municipal buildings

This article originally appeared in the Daily Texan on Tuesday, June 10.

By Laura Rivera, News Desk Editor

The Austin City Council passed a resolution on May 22 directing the city manager to make recommendations that would maximize solar installations on city property. 

Some places the council aims to install solar systems are municipal buildings and parking lots, according to the resolution. Ben Leffler, Councilmember Ryan Alter’s chief of staff, wrote in an email that Alter hopes the city considers both rooftop and ground-mounted solar panels as part of the resolution. The initiative is part of a series of city actions to achieve net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2040, according to the Austin Climate Equity Plan. 

“There are millions of square feet of wasted rooftop space in Austin that could be used to provide cheap, clean power that stabilizes the grid,” Alter wrote in an email. “If we are going to reach our solar goals, we must start thinking big.” 

The city does not have an estimated cost to carry out the goals of the resolution yet, Leffler wrote in an email. As of June 3, the average price for a 5 kW solar panel system in Texas is $10,632, according to EnergySage, an online comparison marketplace for solar energy products. 

Solar panels do not burn fossil fuels, making them a good energy production alternative, said David Eaton, a natural resource policy studies professor. Burning fossil fuels changes the climate the most in comparison to other human activity, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. 

“(With solar panels), you don’t have to build that gas-fired power plant to be able to meet the needs of users,” Eaton said. “It is a reliable source, particularly in an area like Austin that has substantial solar radiation during a large fraction of the year.” 

The Texas Climate Jobs Project, a coalition of labor unions fighting climate change, analyzed 104 city-owned facilities, ranging from fire stations to public libraries, to quantify the benefits of transitioning to solar energy. Achinthya Sivalingam, deputy director for research and policy at the Texas Climate Jobs Project, said the city could mitigate between 4.35 to 9.27 million kilograms of carbon dioxide emissions annually if it installed solar panels on these properties. 

“It’s really critical and crucial that we engage in these conversations of what does the future of our grid look like,” Sivalingam said. “It’s amazing that the city of Austin has taken this huge leap forward and accountability towards making sure that we decarbonize our grid infrastructure.” 

Sivalingam said installing solar panels can also reduce city utility costs. The Texas Climate Jobs Project found that installing solar panels in the 104 facilities could save the city between $2.97 to $4.4 million annually, she said. 

“I hope it helps move money that the city was paying towards their utility bill into making sure that these jobs are good, well-paying jobs for (solar installers) who are working on these sites,” Sivalingam said. “That’s really important.”

Eaton said the resolution can allow the city to become more self-supporting in its electricity production. 

“It makes sense to be able to have multiple uses for (Austin’s) facilities, to put (solar panels) on roofs and in parts of land that don’t have other alternative uses,” Eaton said. “If you can produce electricity … it’s a good idea.”