Speaking before a group of solar enthusiasts last week, Lee, who was inaugurated in January and is the California city’s first Asian mayor, said San Francisco will call for bids from solar panel companies next month for the mounting of photovoltaic cells on the roofs of the City Hall and the Davies Symphony Hall, a local music hub.
Solar panel installations will also be done atop public buildings in government subdivisions like Chinatown and Potrero Hill.
But the mayor was quick to say that he sees the embrace of renewable energy as something that has to extend beyond the municipal government.
“Everybody has got to do that. We want the whole city in 2020 to be 100 per cent renewable energy,” Lee said.
The Mayor is encouraging an increase in reliance on renewable energy not only for the public sector, but for all sectors in society.
The installation of solar panels in public buildings is a project that supports the wider initiative of the state of California to reduce the rate of its carbon emissions and energy usage.
California, although a national leader in environmental protection and energy efficiency, is the 12th largest emitter of carbon globally.
In response to the problem, the state government passed its Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006, which seeks to create a comprehensive program to decrease greenhouse gas emissions from all sources within the state.
The Act compels the California Air Resources Board (CARB) to establish market mechanisms and guidelines to pull down California’s greenhouse gas emissions back to 1990 levels by 2020.
While Lee brings new enthusiasm to the municipal solar initiative, the plan he’s promoting actually pre-dates his administration.
In December 2010, former Mayor Gavin Newsom announced the completion of California’s largest municipal solar installation, the Sunset Reservoir Solar Project.
With nearly 24,000 solar panels installed on top of the North Basin of the Sunset Reservoir, the array generates up to 5 MW of clean energy a day.
The city said that over the 25-year lifetime of the project, the Sunset Reservoir will reduce carbon emissions by approximately 80,000 metric tons, while helping to satisfy the diverse energy needs of the City’s municipal buildings and facilities.
During the same press conference, Newsom also announced the installation of the City’s first four state-of-the-art wind and solar powered hybrid LED streetlights in Civic Centre Plaza as part of a pilot demonstration project installed by the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission.
He also said he planned to move forward with the creation of a “Renewable Energy Task Force” to advise the City on how to best achieve this 100 percent renewable electricity goal.
The Task Force is headed by the San Francisco Environment Department and is comprised of local renewable energy leaders, key stakeholders and other City departments.
The current municipal project was to have been undertaken last year, but was delayed due to conflicts among labour union in the city as to who was authorised to install the panels.
Since then the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission has decided it can continue the project despite the conflict.
At present, the city produces 17 MW of solar electricity.
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