South Miami takes giant step in solar push

It won’t change the world, or even the little piece of it occupied by the City of South Miami, but a city ordinance that requires new residential construction to be equipped with solar panels is a worthy step forward in the fight to save the planet.

Not everyone — including President Trump — believes the planet needs saving from greenhouse gases or that greater use of renewable energy is worth the loss of jobs in coal country. A growing number do, however, and they have made their beliefs known at the ballot box and by growing investment in renewables.

Florida’s pro-solar Amendment Four won overwhelming voter approval last year. And the latest figures from the Florida Public Service Commission report a 38 percent increase in the use of renewables at the end of 2016, a total of 15,999 systems.

While still small for a state of 20 million people, conversion to solar systems has climbed as costs have fallen in recent years.

The South Miami ordinance — the first in Florida — is the work of Mayor Philip Stoddard, an FIU biology professor who was inspired by several California cities that passed similar ordinances. Stoddard won the support of three others on the city council with the opposition of just one.

Most vocally opposed are builders who say imposing a solar mandate will drive up the cost of housing. That’s marginally true, but so does a swimming pool, which is almost standard equipment in new residential housing. The builders suggest that the use of solar should be an option, not a mandate.

The allure of solar energy in a place like Florida is — or should be — a no-brainer. The state ranks third in the nation for potential, but only 12th in taking advantage of that potential. The Sunshine State should be a leader in this movement, not a laggard.

The economic case for solar is simple: Sunshine costs nothing. The equipment necessary to turn it into usable electricity costs about $11,000 for the average home. During daylight hours, the home is powered by that free sunshine.

At night FPL steps in. At the end of the day, if more of the home’s electrical needs are satisfied by the sun, the homeowner gets money back from the utility at the retail rate, what is known as “net metering.”

Florida Power & Light argues that the payoff on a solar-powered home is slow in coming, years in fact. And if it had its way, the payback would be longer still. Buying the solar user’s excess generation at the retail rate is unfair to the non-solar users, the utility asserts. The utility would like to see a two-rate system, one that pays the solar user less than the retail rate for the energy his home puts back into the grid.

Such a move would dramatically slow the growth of solar use.

In Nevada, where the two-tier rate approach carried the day, solar sign-ups plummeted after the PSC lowered the net metering rate from 11 cents per kilowatt hour to 2.6, effectively destroying the economic case for homeowners to invest in solar systems.

But the more powerful case for solar is environmental not economic, though the economic case can be made. For example, Realtors estimate that an average kitchen remodeling costs between $20,000 and $60,000 and adds roughly 80 percent to the value of a home on resale.

Solar costs less to install, ultimately generates an income stream and dramatically reduces a home’s carbon footprint. Multiply that by thousands, and you begin to see the wisdom of South Miami’s small but courageous step.

We owe Mayor Stoddard a pat on the back. He and his small city might just touch off a solar revolution.