Background: ◻ Large-scale solar (LSS) energy development can positively and negatively impact loc... more Background: ◻ Large-scale solar (LSS) energy development can positively and negatively impact local host communities, but those impacts have been understudied. ◻ Local opposition is increasingly cited as a leading barrier to LSS deployment 1 but sources of that opposition are not well understood. ◻ The details of siting, planning, design, and engagement processes for LSS and how they might influence attitudes is a significant gap in the literature. ◻ Interviews in seven communities surrounding LSS projects by this project team provided useful but as-of-yet nationally untested insights into sources of positive and negative attitudes. 2 ◻ What are the key correlates for positive and negative community attitudes toward built LSS projects? ◻ How generalizable are these findings across a national sample of LSS neighbors? ◻ What can be learned from individuals leaving near LSS that could inform how future LSS should be developed? 4 1. Battaglia et al., 2009; Deming, 1943 2. Following Potter and Zheng (2015), we trimmed maximum weight values to be no larger than the median + five times the interquartile range
Journal of Environmental Policy & Planning, Jul 18, 2022
The rapid expansion of solar and wind energy projects is raising questions of energy justice. Som... more The rapid expansion of solar and wind energy projects is raising questions of energy justice. Some scholars argue that solar and wind project development could burden under-resourced communities with negative impacts such as environmental harm and reduced access to resources. Conversely, other scholars argue that project development could be a boon to under-resourced communities, providing local economic and cultural benefits. Here, we analyze the drivers of solar and wind project siting patterns in the United States and explore their potential energy justice implications. We find that siting patterns are driven primarily by technoeconomic factors, especially resource quality and access to open undeveloped spaces. These technoeconomic factors channel projects into sparsely populated rural areas and, to a lesser extent, areas with lower income levels. We avoid simplifying assumptions about the broad justice implications of these siting patterns and explore our results from multiple perspectives.
is being disseminated by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). As such, this document was prepared... more is being disseminated by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). As such, this document was prepared in compliance with Section 515 of the Treasury and General Government Appropriations Act for fiscal year 2001 (public law 106-554) and information quality guidelines issued by DOE. Though this report does not constitute "influential" information, as that term is defined in DOE's information quality guidelines or the Office of Management and Budget's Information Quality Bulletin for Peer Review, the study was reviewed both internally and externally prior to publication. For purposes of external review, the study benefited from the advice and comments of 12 industry stakeholders, U.S. Government employees, and national laboratory staff.
Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, Oct 1, 2017
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory led a survey of 1,729 individuals located within 8 km of ut... more Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory led a survey of 1,729 individuals located within 8 km of utility scale wind turbines in the United States. The survey included respondents around both large and small wind projects throughout the country. The survey focused on social acceptance, procedural and distributional justice, landscape and sound perceptions and annoyance, and compensation. A total of 15 of the wind projects were modeled to estimate the sound levels at each respondent’s home. Modeled metrics included background sound levels, maximum one-hour sound levels, percentage of time the respondent is downwind of a turbine, and a long-term sound level estimate using the local wind project capacity factor. Statistical analyses were conducted to estimate the acoustical drivers (sound level and sound level difference above background) toward the propensity for annoyance, and how these were affected by non-acoustic factors (e.g., compensation, prior attitude toward the project, visibility, etc.).
Objective: Describe commercial PV adopter trends as it relates to real estate, highlighting diffe... more Objective: Describe commercial PV adopter trends as it relates to real estate, highlighting differences in PV vs. non-PV properties and potential opportunities for future deployment. -Nationwide commercial real estate database: SMR Research address-level real estate database has nationwide coverage and contains a rich set of property and building descriptive fields. Almost 2.5 million properties are used for this analysis -Relatively extensive coverage of the U.S. solar market: Based on Berkeley Lab's Tracking the Sun (TTS) dataset, of roughly 1.3 million systems, covering ~81% of the total U.S. market (Barbose et al., 2018) -Manual sample infilling: To accommodate for the difficulty of matching commercial property address records from multiple sources, manual infilling of a representative sample is conducted Considerable effort was made (as will be discussed on following slides) to ensure the analysis focused on non-residential real estate while excluding community & utility-scale solar. -Systems installed through 2017 in 20 states: Focuses on states in TTS dataset with address data available for installs through 2017 encompassing ~32,000 installs; later work may evaluate more-recent adopters and additional states -Basic descriptive trends: Focus here is on establishing building and solar system characteristic trends over time, among states and property types and, where possible, describe PV and non-PV property differences
Background: ◻ Large-scale solar (LSS) energy development can positively and negatively impact loc... more Background: ◻ Large-scale solar (LSS) energy development can positively and negatively impact local host communities, but those impacts have been understudied. ◻ Local opposition is increasingly cited as a leading barrier to LSS deployment 1 but sources of that opposition are not well understood. ◻ The details of siting, planning, design, and engagement processes for LSS and how they might influence attitudes is a significant gap in the literature. ◻ Interviews in seven communities surrounding LSS projects by this project team provided useful but as-of-yet nationally untested insights into sources of positive and negative attitudes. 2 ◻ What are the key correlates for positive and negative community attitudes toward built LSS projects? ◻ How generalizable are these findings across a national sample of LSS neighbors? ◻ What can be learned from individuals leaving near LSS that could inform how future LSS should be developed? 4 1. Battaglia et al., 2009; Deming, 1943 2. Following Potter and Zheng (2015), we trimmed maximum weight values to be no larger than the median + five times the interquartile range
Journal of Environmental Policy & Planning, Jul 18, 2022
The rapid expansion of solar and wind energy projects is raising questions of energy justice. Som... more The rapid expansion of solar and wind energy projects is raising questions of energy justice. Some scholars argue that solar and wind project development could burden under-resourced communities with negative impacts such as environmental harm and reduced access to resources. Conversely, other scholars argue that project development could be a boon to under-resourced communities, providing local economic and cultural benefits. Here, we analyze the drivers of solar and wind project siting patterns in the United States and explore their potential energy justice implications. We find that siting patterns are driven primarily by technoeconomic factors, especially resource quality and access to open undeveloped spaces. These technoeconomic factors channel projects into sparsely populated rural areas and, to a lesser extent, areas with lower income levels. We avoid simplifying assumptions about the broad justice implications of these siting patterns and explore our results from multiple perspectives.
is being disseminated by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). As such, this document was prepared... more is being disseminated by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). As such, this document was prepared in compliance with Section 515 of the Treasury and General Government Appropriations Act for fiscal year 2001 (public law 106-554) and information quality guidelines issued by DOE. Though this report does not constitute "influential" information, as that term is defined in DOE's information quality guidelines or the Office of Management and Budget's Information Quality Bulletin for Peer Review, the study was reviewed both internally and externally prior to publication. For purposes of external review, the study benefited from the advice and comments of 12 industry stakeholders, U.S. Government employees, and national laboratory staff.
Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, Oct 1, 2017
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory led a survey of 1,729 individuals located within 8 km of ut... more Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory led a survey of 1,729 individuals located within 8 km of utility scale wind turbines in the United States. The survey included respondents around both large and small wind projects throughout the country. The survey focused on social acceptance, procedural and distributional justice, landscape and sound perceptions and annoyance, and compensation. A total of 15 of the wind projects were modeled to estimate the sound levels at each respondent’s home. Modeled metrics included background sound levels, maximum one-hour sound levels, percentage of time the respondent is downwind of a turbine, and a long-term sound level estimate using the local wind project capacity factor. Statistical analyses were conducted to estimate the acoustical drivers (sound level and sound level difference above background) toward the propensity for annoyance, and how these were affected by non-acoustic factors (e.g., compensation, prior attitude toward the project, visibility, etc.).
Objective: Describe commercial PV adopter trends as it relates to real estate, highlighting diffe... more Objective: Describe commercial PV adopter trends as it relates to real estate, highlighting differences in PV vs. non-PV properties and potential opportunities for future deployment. -Nationwide commercial real estate database: SMR Research address-level real estate database has nationwide coverage and contains a rich set of property and building descriptive fields. Almost 2.5 million properties are used for this analysis -Relatively extensive coverage of the U.S. solar market: Based on Berkeley Lab's Tracking the Sun (TTS) dataset, of roughly 1.3 million systems, covering ~81% of the total U.S. market (Barbose et al., 2018) -Manual sample infilling: To accommodate for the difficulty of matching commercial property address records from multiple sources, manual infilling of a representative sample is conducted Considerable effort was made (as will be discussed on following slides) to ensure the analysis focused on non-residential real estate while excluding community & utility-scale solar. -Systems installed through 2017 in 20 states: Focuses on states in TTS dataset with address data available for installs through 2017 encompassing ~32,000 installs; later work may evaluate more-recent adopters and additional states -Basic descriptive trends: Focus here is on establishing building and solar system characteristic trends over time, among states and property types and, where possible, describe PV and non-PV property differences
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