Automated Permitting becomes Law in CA

I am excited to share a major milestone in America’s journey to reduce solar costs. It has been nearly 5 years since I started SolarAPP+ – the campaign to automate permitting in the US. Thanks to a lot of late nights from tons of amazing solar people and a huge effort across a consortium of solar friendly organisations, we’ve won our first legislative victory! Governor Newsom just signed automated permitting into CA law! This sets CA on a path to halve the cost of home solar to the levels we have in most other countries around the world today.

SolarAPP+ is an online, automated process to grant instant solar permits to contractors, live today in 22 cities that have adopted the technology. This law requires CA cities to migrate to SolarAPP+ (or equivalent) over the next couple of years. Please join CalSSA with your membership dollars and in supporting your city to migrate quickly so you can install the next day and save thousands of dollars in Opex – all while maintaining the quality, safety, and code standards through the approved SolarAPP+ process.

In combination with IRA, we have a real opportunity to scale affordable, clean energy to every home in CA – and hopefully soon the entire US – as we look to migrate SolarAPP+ across the country with supporters like Secretary Granholm and the amazing solar state associations.

Thank you to everyone involved, especially CalSSA & NREL. Plenty of times it looked like we wouldn’t get there but, as always, perseverance wins out (and it helps being on the right side of history).

You can read more about the legislation here.

Cheers,
Birchy