Rapidly Increasing Distributed Solar, Storage Critical to Achieving President Biden’s Climate & Equity Goals at Lowest Cost: Report

The U.S. must deploy a minimum of 103 gigawatts (GW) of distributed, local solar power and 137 GW of distributed energy storage by 2030 to achieve President Biden’s climate and equity goals at the lowest cost.

This is one of the core findings of a new report issued by Local Solar for All, a broad coalition of local solar advocates, based on analysis from electric grid modeling experts Vibrant Clean Energy.

The report is part of a growing body of research that calls out the financial and societal benefits of significantly growing the amount of local, distributed solar and storage deployed on the U.S. electric grid.

“This modeling aligns with other research and represents a floor for how much distributed rooftop and community solar and storage will be needed to meet President Biden’s clean energy, climate, and equity goals at the lowest cost,” said Jeff Cramer, Executive Director of the Coalition for Community Solar Access.

Using conservative cost and technology assumptions, the report examined how to build the lowest cost grid using President Biden’s climate goals as key constraints: 80% clean electricity by 2030, 50% economy-wide carbon reductions by 2030, 95% economy-wide carbon reductions by 2050, and 100% electrification of the economy by 2050.