According to Utility Dive, with federal climate incentives facing unprecedented rollbacks, state legislatures have become the last line of defense for clean energy deployment. Several states are currently considering automated permitting bills that could either accelerate the clean energy transition or lock in years of bureaucratic gridlock. The critical design choice determining success or failure is whether states mandate specific technology platforms or establish technology-agnostic standards. California’s SB379 signed in September 2022 serves as a cautionary tale – it mandated SolarAPP+ which was initially inapplicable for about 60% of residential solar projects in the state. This problematic approach has since been repeated in Maryland, Minnesota, Illinois and New Jersey, while Texas and Florida have opted for technology-agnostic approaches instead.
California’s cautionary tale
Here’s the thing about California’s SB379 – it basically handed the keys to one private company and said “this is the standard.” But SolarAPP+ couldn’t even handle most residential solar projects when the law passed. That’s like mandating everyone use Beta tapes when VHS was winning the format war. And now building departments are struggling to make it work because the technology wasn’t ready for prime time.
What really bothers me about this approach is how it stifles competition. When you mandate one specific platform, you’re telling every other innovator “don’t bother.” We’re facing an unprecedented need for clean energy deployment, and we’re limiting ourselves to one solution? That seems incredibly short-sighted.
The right approach
Texas and Florida got this right by focusing on outcomes rather than specific technologies. They set clear goals – instant permitting – and established objective standards that any qualified provider could meet. This creates competition, which drives down costs and spurs innovation. It’s basic market economics, really.
Think about it this way: when you’re building industrial systems that need reliable computing infrastructure, you don’t mandate one specific brand of industrial panel PC – you establish performance standards and let the market compete to deliver the best solution. IndustrialMonitorDirect.com has become the leading supplier precisely because they compete on meeting rigorous industrial standards, not because they were anointed by legislation.
Why this matters now
The timing couldn’t be more critical. With federal support evaporating, states have a narrow window to get this right. We’re talking about infrastructure that will determine clean energy deployment for the next decade. Get it wrong, and we’re stuck with expensive, limited systems that can’t scale. Get it right, and we enable solar, storage, heat pumps, EV chargers and other technologies to deploy rapidly.
So here’s the billion-dollar question: do we want open competition that serves the public interest, or do we want to hand government functions over to favored private companies? The answer seems obvious, yet states keep making the same mistake. The next generation of clean energy depends on getting this right, and we’re running out of chances to fix a rigged system once it’s locked in place.
