There are many ways to do solar right

Xcel Energy has been talking a lot about solar energy this year. Advertising proclaiming the need to "Do Solar Right" was ubiquitous before the utility proposed a new solar program of 50MW of centralized power that it wants to sell the public. It's encouraging that Xcel believes there is a market for lots more solar energy. It shows that the utility is realizing all the benefits: solar energy emits no harmful air pollution, it uses no water, and it harvests the abundant free fuel that Colorado is blessed with 300 days a year. Solar is starting to compete favorably with other energy sources in price, and the economics keep improving. As the solar industry has proven over the last three decades, there is more than one way to do solar right. The thousands of Coloradans who have chosen to go solar by putting panels on their roofs and contributing clean energy to their neighbors are doing solar right. The hundreds of entrepreneurial installers who have built a strong solar industry that has contributed $1.42 billion to Colorado's economy since 2007 are doing solar right. The national players who have introduced zero-down leases to make solar affordable to nearly everyone are doing solar right. The pioneering community solar developers who have shown how to bring the benefits of solar to renters and condo-dwellers are also doing solar right. So are the innovative non-profits and government agencies who are bringing solar to low-income and disabled people. Just since 2007, Colorado's solar industry has brought Coloradans more than $44.4 million in environmental benefits through avoiding emissions of pollutants tied to conventional electricity production, and saved nearly 400 million gallons of water, which would have otherwise been used generating electricity. The roughly 20,000 Coloradans who have made their own investments in generating rooftop power are a big part of solar's growing success. Not only are they exercising their freedom of choice, but they are also creating real benefits for everyone else. The benefits of rooftop solar — distributed rather than centralized power generation — are many. Our aging power supply system is increasingly vulnerable to equipment malfunctions, wildfires in beetle-killed forests where huge transmission lines run, and other natural and man-made threats. Solar generated in neighborhoods and backed up with energy storage (a coming trend) will become increasingly important for our energy security and independence. Rooftop solar also helps lower electric bills for the rest of us. A recent study by national experts Crossborder Energy found that in Colorado, the value of rooftop solar is 18.2 cents per kilowatt hour -- with avoided energy, avoided emissions and avoided generation capacity the biggest of nine different contributing factors. This value is much higher than the credit solar customers receive. Rooftop solar benefits all Xcel ratepayers to the tune of $13.6 million a year, Crossborder has found. Independent studies in other states have confirmed that rooftop solar brings net benefits to all ratepayers. Coloradans who are installing solar energy on rooftops are lowering monthly electric bills for the rest of us. That is doing solar right. While discrediting the value of power produced by rooftop solar using flawed math, Xcel is pushing for its new Solar Connect proposal for 50 MW of centralized solar. The monopoly utility seeks to sell shares to the public, in competition with the solar industry's community solar gardens and rooftop offerings. Large solar projects have an important role to play in our state's energy future. But we hope that our state regulators and policy makers will realize the state's solar industry has been doing solar right for years to help Colorado grow into a solar leader. Giving Xcel an unfair advantage in the marketplace would not be doing solar right. Rebecca Cantwell is executive director of the Colorado Solar Energy Industries Association.