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Solar Energy Forums Shine Light On Permitting Process

One of Progress Energy's solar energy farms.
Duke Energy
/
Progress Energy

North Carolina’s solar energy industry has garnered much success in recent years – from solar panels to solar farms. 

In 2012, the state was ranked the 5th Top Solar State in the nation by the Solar Energy Industries Association.  And the North Carolina Sustainable Energy Association reports there are more than 15,000 full-time equivalent employees working in the state's clean energy industry at 1,100 companies.

But still many local governments, land owners and the general public are not educated on the solar energy permitting process.

Tommy Cleveland is a Solar Engineer at the North Carolina Solar Center.  He says they hope a special series of forums will address the problem.

“What’s happening right now in North Carolina is a very wide range of requirements from county to county and municipality to municipality.  And many times because there are no solar specific rules in the county it is difficult to know what the permitting process will be," said Cleveland.

Cleveland says a solar template ordinance would make the process more consistent and transparent.

The first forum on Solar Development is Friday at the Natural Sciences Museum in Raleigh.  Others are set for Greensboro, Lumberton, Asheville and Charlotte.

Leoneda Inge is the co-host of WUNC's "Due South." Leoneda has been a radio journalist for more than 30 years, spending most of her career at WUNC as the Race and Southern Culture reporter. Leoneda’s work includes stories of race, slavery, memory and monuments. She has won "Gracie" awards, an Alfred I. duPont Award and several awards from the Radio, Television, Digital News Association (RTDNA). In 2017, Leoneda was named "Journalist of Distinction" by the National Association of Black Journalists.
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