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A new framework for solar energy focused on community and learning

Solar has the potential to work amazingly. Costs have declined 80% over the past ten years and technology has become more commercially viable. Yet, we see solar is only 1.3% of the US’s total energy consumption. So what’s going on? We have the technology. We have the economics. What’s missing? What’s missing is the human component.

When I began working in the solar sector, to be honest, I saw a huge problem. I saw a lack of empathy in the industry. I saw companies carry out what they thought was right, but they didn’t truly know what people need. I saw this in my own work as well. I was working on a consulting project where we were trying to accelerate mid-sized solar projects. My team thought low costs would surely convince utilities to carry out these projects so my team modeled the economics and showed utilities millions of dollars of savings for one project, yet, many of them were still not interested in doing a solar project. Cost wasn’t the answer- or at least not the main motivator.

So what was the problem? The problem was that we were missing a whole underlying component. We were not designing for our users so they were not using our solutions. This drove me to answer the question ”How might we convince utilities to implement mid-sized solar projects in an empathetic way?”

I used design thinking to create two solutions for this problem: a website called The Solar Procurement Framework and in-person workshops. Here is the design process I followed:

01. Empathy Interviews

After we realized saving millions of dollars couldn’t convince utilities to carry out a solar project, we went back to the drawing board and we interviewed many utilities across the country. I asked them about their motivations in their careers, what their lives looked like on a deeper level, explored what resistance they might have to renewables and why, and understood who they interacted with on a day to day basis. I wanted to know them on a more personal level instead of asking leading questions to push renewables on them. 

02. Define Insights

What we found from these interviews was that there was a fear. While the economics were good, there was a fear of being the first person to carry out a project in their region. Instead, they wanted a sense of community where they could learn from each other and see what the risks were. Basically, what they wanted was a friend to say “it’s gonna be ok, the risks are worth it.”

03. Ideate, Prototype, and Test

These insights changed our approach completely. Instead of pitching the economics, we created a website and workshops focused on community and learning. The website we created was a step-by-step playbook of how to carry out a mid-sized solar project and was intended to alleviate fear of the risks of solar implementation by showing the process in a way that was easy to understand and weigh the costs and benefits. We created utility focus groups to test the playbook and gathered feedback along the way. To leverage the need for community, we designed workshops where utilities could learn from leaders in their region that had previously carried out a solar project. This allowed people to ask questions which has been way more successful.

Learnings

What I learned from this project is that empathy is important. And if we don’t use it we fail. And often spend a lot more money coming back to the drawing board. Designing solar with users in mind and through creativity lead to better results and really helped us accelerate our efforts to fight climate change.

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