EXECUTIVE TALK SERIES:
How SolarAPP+ Will Dramatically Reduce Permitting Application Time for Solar Installers
Jan Rippingale – Founder & CEO of Blu Banyan, talks about how the SolarAPP+ (Solar Automated Permit Processing Plus platform) is cutting through layers and layers of bureaucracy, which is essential as we power the energy information infrastructure.
Why this is important:
In this presentation, Jan Rippingale walks you through how to leverage the SolarAPP+ application and explains the significant amount of time (27 to 56 days of processing time reduced to a one-day process) and resources you would save by utilizing SolarSuccess which is being fully integrated with SolarAPP+.
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Full transcript:
How SolarAPP+ Integration with SolarSuccess Will Dramatically Reduce Permitting Application Time for Solar Installers
The next exciting piece of this progression is to show how our common tools fit together. And the biggest common tool that I think we’re all going to be utilizing in the next several years is the SolarAPP+ (Solar Automated Permit Processing Plus platform). And it really is cutting through layers and layers of bureaucracy, which is essential as we power the energy information infrastructure.
The SolarAPP+ permitting process has already demonstrated substantial improvements in how things are working. We are scaling tremendously. In 2021, we had a 30% year over year uptick in the installed solar capacity. And literally the mission of Blue Banyan is to make sure that uptick increases and grows faster and faster.
So, the need to do this in a systemic efficient manner is only increasing as we collectively work to meet the Paris Climate Accord agreements that we made as a country. We need to address this challenge and it is happening quick and it is happening right now.
Since its launch, SolarAPP+ has saved the AHJs over 3,000 hours of staff time, and that’s growing every day.
It is amazing the amount of time that gets freed up at the AHJs to be able to focus on improving safety where it’s needed. So, this is absolutely a, a gain for each AHJ.
To-date, SolarAPP+ has processed over 7,600 residential solar permits. And I did have a conversation with Jeff Cook (Renewable Energy Policy and Market Analyst, NREL), at InterSolar North America in February, 2023 and he said that it was closer to 15,000 at this point in time.
So, we are absolutely gaining speed and momentum and how many permits are getting processed using the SolarAPP+ application.
California as usual has taken everything up to the next level. So as of September, 2022, they passed the Solar Access Act, which means that in one year, which is by the end of September, 2023, all of the medium to large size AHJs in the state of California need to be using SolarAPP+ or its equivalent. And by September, 2024, all AHJs in the state of California need to be using SolarAPP+ or its equivalent.
California is requiring it for all of its jurisdictions because it’s improving the safety and reducing the costs. So higher quality delivery of services to homeowners and citizens while simultaneously reducing the expenses and helping us deploy more solar faster.
It’s a win-win-win. California’s requiring it, and we do expect, especially the sunbelt states are going to follow.
As of today, as this moment, I’m recording. These are the AHJs that are fully active, those that are in pilots and those that are testing. These are the maturing ones, and it is changing almost every single day. So, you need to go to this URL here (https://help.solar-app.org/article/108-where-is-solarapp-available) to see where the SolarAPP+ is available. The list is growing and going to continue to grow.
It is going to focus on the sunbelt states first because that’s the highest impact and we expect to see this to go the states that aren’t sunbelt states who haven’t really experienced the volumes of solar installations that the sunbelt states have. Are going to follow the same patterns because they are even less motivated to make up a new way of doing things. So, this is how we’re all getting on the same page.
Let me show you how all of these pieces fit together with the common tools.
We’ve got a solar installer, the AHJ, and then all of these common tools and databases over here. So, the solar installer, and in this case they’re on SolarSuccess, but whichever tool that they’re using is going to automatically submit an application to SolarAPP+ and they’re using an Orange Button compliant API, so that this same API can be used with any Orange Button compliance software, and it sends over all of the data so you don’t have to retype the pieces that are already in your system.
This saves half to two thirds of the time and without errors right off the bat. So, this one transaction is actually a 50% efficiency gain. Next, if you don’t already have the AHJ assigned with the AHJ ID, SolarAPP+ will identify and find that for you. They’re using the same AHJ identifiers, as SolarSuccess uses, and you’ll get that AHJ ID back.
If you don’t have clearly defined products yet from the Product Registry, it will go and find those products that you’re using. And return those product IDs back into SolarAPP+ so it’ll know which certifications you’ve got.
It will take the application; it’ll pull together this common reference data.
So, the specific data for the project comes from the installer, the common reference data comes from the registries, and then with that it will construct the SolarAPP+ application questions.
So, at some point in time these questions will come back to SolarSuccess and other products, but for now you, you click on a link and it’ll take you to this questionnaire and that you’ve fill out the rest of the pieces that you’ve got to say about – yes, I’m using the right wire gauge, or whatever detail of questions that you probably don’t have in your bill of materials.
So, it’ll answer any of the questions that are remaining, and we do expect these questions to change over time. Storage was added in Q4 of 2022. We’re expecting more and more sophisticated questions to come up as we roll out nationally. Once the questions are fully done and submitted, it goes to the AHJ. They will review the process and either approve or reject it.
And if they approve it, then you’ve got your permit ID that feeds back into the software and in SolarSuccess. Then that next step is it triggers scheduling the installation. This is a one-day process versus the average currently of 27 days, even in this sunbelt states that they’re most active in. When it’s not Sunbelt states, we’re looking at an average of 56 days to get your permit.
So, we’re taking 27 to 56 days of timeline, of homeowner frustration, of delayed gratification, and we’re turning it into this one-day process with less data entry, fewer errors, greater clarity.
It’s happier for the homeowner, it’s happier for the installer, it’s happier for the AHJ. Everybody wins. It’s time to move to the new world.
This is a quick demo of what it can look like in SolarSuccess. So, you’re on a given project, you’ve got a SolarAPP+ project id, and then you’ll see that we’ve got the SolarAPP+ specific information here on this job.
The job type is a particularly important piece of information for the different SolarAPP+ job types. You need to know if it’s PV or PV+storage, and building integrated PV is being added next.
So, PV and PV+storage are a key field that you need to have for the questions.
When you finished your product, you click create the SolarAPP+ application on your project when you’re ready for that stage, the status shifts and you just wait. You can click and get the SolarAPP+ status (if you’re super OCD and need a button to click) or you can just wait and it will pull every 30 minutes until it’s completed.
When the application comes in and, and it’s done, you have this link and this is where you go and get prompted to fill in your question.
You sign into the account and you’ll see the actions to fill out your questions, and you can actually edit and change things here if you’d like to. All of the power is still in the installer hands.
And as the status goes, each time you ping, you can check the status and see what happened. When this is marked as approved, this looks super detailed. You’ve got the full detail accessible to you. If you want to have that transparency, but you don’t need it. You can just wait and say that it’s approved and it’ll move to the next status saying it’s time to schedule the install.
So, pulling this all together, that’s an example of how this works with SolarSuccess and with different software, they may well have that flow look differently. But it can be as complex where you watch all the details or as simple as you would like. The end result of all of this is that we have higher productivity, the data accuracy is improved and standard formats, we’ve got the integration and this means that we have more throughput.
We can do more jobs with the same number of people as we could before. This gives us more bandwidth so the faster we complete the projects and the less time we need to spend on doing the project management for these projects, the more time we can spend in the field delivering the projects as we move forward.
So, you can take on more projects.
This is better for financing. You can get better quality financing and more people are interested in financing because the process is more standardized. If everybody knows that the permitting is happening according to the national standard and that national standard is clear, the risk goes down for the financiers, because all they need to do is say, yes, I trust that NREL has worked this out, and that we are installing to the right level of safety that we need to be installing with. And the financiers are happy. What they want is consistency. So, by automating this in a consistent way across the entire country, we’re actually freeing up capital to be better, more available, and available at better terms for the entire country.
This gives everyone a higher return on investment (ROI). It costs less so the homeowner gets a higher return on their investment in solar, the solar installers can have higher margins and spend less money on overhead, time and frustration, and reduce their risk. The financing also reduces their risk. And the AHJs spend less time going over this.
The inspection statistics show that it’s exactly the same. Doing a SolarAPP+ application, you have the exact same inspection failure rates as you do with the paper-based application. So, everybody experienced a higher ROI in the area that they’re most interested in.
It is only goodness that we roll this out to everybody, and we’ve got a large and growing contingency of people interested in bringing this reality to all of us.
Everyone in the entire industry is affected by using the common tool and benefits from the energy information infrastructure that we are pulling together. So, this is the key for us being able to scale at the rate that we need to scale at, to meet our commitments for the Paris Climate Accord, but also just to meet the commitments we have to our children that we are going to leave this world better than we found it.
This is how we do it. This is how we make these high-minded sounding dreams into reality.
So, I look forward to your participation.
Thank you.
