Echo Valley Apartment Complex installs rooftop solar for its residents and community

The town of West Warwick is home to about 29,000 residents and ranks 10^th in population out of 39 cities and towns in Rhode Island. West Warwick is also home to the Echo Valley Apartment Complex, which provides affordable housing to about 100 families.

Echo Valley recently completed a 426 kW rooftop community solar project, which is now interconnected and serving  residents of the complex and the surrounding community. This solar system is expected to produce over 581,000 kWh annually, which is equivalent to the amount of electricity needed to power about 100 homes in RI. This solar project became operational in August 2020, and is 100 percent subscribed.

This community solar project is a part of the Community Remote Distributed Generation (CRDG) program. This program allows a power management company to pass the monetary value of renewable electricity generated by the solar array  onto its subscribers in the form of bill credits on their monthly  electric bill. In addition, qualifying Low to Moderate Income (LMI) subscribers may receive a rebate up to $500. This money can  be used to provide further relief to LMI customers beyond the savings generated by the community solar project.

This is the first community solar array for an affordable housing complex in Rhode Island. Community solar projects allow Rhode Island residents to share the benefits of solar power, even if they cannot install solar panels on their roof or property. This project and other community solar projects can be found by visiting the RI Community Solar Marketplace, at https://risolarmarketplace.com/all-projects/. 

"PowerMarket is incredibly proud of its role in subscribing the low-income residents of the Echo Valley Apartments to this community solar project. This is a realization of our goal to bring guaranteed savings to low-income communities through local, renewable energy. We are eager to take the lessons learned and experiences acquired here to ensure the successful inclusion of low-income residents in community solar programs nationally," said Jason Kaplan, COO at PowerMarket.