Solar panels will cut energy costs for Housing Nantucket tenants

With a new $50,000 in its pocket, nonprofit organization Housing Nantucket is doing its part to improve access to clean energy by installing solar panels on several of its island properties.

The solar panels will lower the electric costs for those living in six of Housing Nantucket’s units.

Housing Nantucket provides 38 affordable rental units as well as homeownership opportunities. The group sought to help its low- and moderate-income tenants who aren’t eligible for reduced utility rates.

Five of the six solar panel installations are already complete, according to Housing Nantucket Executive Director Anne Kuszpa. The $180,000 project is also funded by $55,000 in grants and $75,000 in money raised by Housing Nantucket.

National Grid has a reduced electricity rate for low-income tenants. However, a tenant who is low-income, but not low enough to receive the reduced rate, is required to pay the same rate as their high- or moderate-income neighbors, according to Kuszpa,

The energy rates on Nantucket are extremely high, due to the extra transmission charge residents must pay to get power to the island, she said.

“So when you have low-income tenants, they're paying the same rate as the (high-income tenants),” she said. “So it just means a lot more proportionally to that low-income family than it would to, say, the wealthier summer person.”

More: Judge rules in racist graffiti at Nantucket's African Meeting House civil rights lawsuit

More: After years of uncertainty, Falmouth wind turbines to be demolished

Housing Nantucket creates these affordable rentals by receiving donations of buildings , moving the structures via truck to its land and recycling those structures for new housing. Those older buildings, however, are not as energy efficient as newly constructed ones, which creates higher utility rates for tenants, Kuszpa said.

Kuszpa said they choose which properties for solar panels based on the roof — south-facing roofs that are larger, longer and had continuous surfaces to place panels on will be the most efficient.

Adding solar panels has been a long-term goal of the organization. Since the properties already had energy audits from the National Grid, Housing Nantucket began searching for  grants. Along with the money received from the state, they applied to grants from Remain Nantucket — an organization with an initiative to bring clean, renewable energy to the island — and put a call out to their community for donations. They also began raising money from their own reserves to see how they could budget for solar panels.

Tenants to earn energy credits

Housing Nantucket will also be using solar renewable energy credits from the state through the Solar Massachusetts Renewable Target Program. The SMART Program serves as a sustainable solar incentive program to improve solar development throughout the state.

“We put these systems on the dwellings, and then the tenant just uses that energy. And if they use more energy than what their solar panels produce, then they get billed by National Grid. If they use less energy than what the solar panels produce, then what National Grid does, is they build up credit for electricity,” Kuszpa said.

“So if you don't use an air conditioner, for example, in the summertime, then you can save those credits that you make in summertime. So when it's the wintertime, and you turn on your heat, you're kind of using the energy created in the summer,” she continued.

If there’s excess electricity being generated that one tenant doesn’t need, Housing Nantucket will utilize “net metering,” where the National Grid allows the property to take those unused credits generated at one location and use them at a different location for a tenant who may need the electricity and doesn’t have solar panels.

“We knew that we would be able to participate in that program, but the big hurdle for us was … because we're nonprofit, we don't have access to the state and federal tax benefits that make putting solar panels on your house as a taxpayer really attractive and make it more affordable,” Kuszpa said.

Housing Nantucket’s tax exemption requires the organization to pay full price for solar panels, though the money they’ve raised through grants and donations has funded most of the project.

Housing Nantucket partnered with Nantucket’s solar firm, ACK Smart, to see how many panels they could fit on each roof before going to the Nantucket Historic District Commission for design review and approval. Once through the review process, ACK Smart gave the group an estimated cost of about $30,000 per installation, according to Kuszpa. ACK Smart will be physically installing those systems.

“Part of this whole initiative was that it's part of a revolving energy fund. And that's the thing that was unique and that EmPower really liked about what we're doing,” Kuszpa added.

More solar installations planned

Creating a revolving energy fund involves raising tenant rent and using money received from smart credits to create a pool of money Housing Nantucket can use to create “round two.” While the organization will increase tenant rent, tenants won’t be paying electric bills — thanks to the solar panels — and will actually save money.

In the meantime, Housing Nantucket will put its new rent income into a fund it can use to create the next phase of this project adding solar panels to more properties.

The latest $50,000 grant was a piece of the $2.2 million awarded to 32 different state organizations by the Baker-Polito administration through Massachusetts Clean Energy Center’s EmPower Massachusetts Program. MassCEC and the Department of Energy Resources provided the funding.

In awarding these funds, the Massachusetts Clean Energy Center’s EmPower Massachusetts Program promotes the implementation of clean energy practices throughout the state. The 32 organizations, spanning from Amherst to Nantucket, received funds ranging from about $11,000 to $150,000.

Ella Adams is a news intern for the Cape Cod Times.

This article originally appeared on Cape Cod Times: Solar panels will help Housing Nantucket tenants reduce costs