The United States has an unprecedented opportunity to create next-generation American jobs and positively impact the planet with a strong investment in solar energy and energy storage. Orbit Energy & Power joins the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA) in urging Congress to extend the solar and energy storage tax credit for at least ten years with direct-pay so that more families can share in the benefits of solar regardless of income.
Right now, homeowners and farmers who go solar are eligible for a 26 percent federal tax credit, a benefit that has helped countless families transition from fossil fuels to clean energy. Utilities keep raising the rates they charge to provide electricity. Consumers pay these ever-higher bills without seeing a return, and without ever owning their power.
By offsetting the cost of installing solar, the federal solar tax credit helps people get free from these rate hikes, but only if they have the tax liability to take advantage of it, and only for one more year. At the end of 2022, the 26 percent tax credit will step down to 22 percent, and the following year it will go down to zero[1].
This is no time to hamstring a growing and vital industry by letting its incentives die.
According to SEIA statistics[2], the $25 billion American solar industry employs more than 230,000 people, despite the COVID pandemic and rising supply chain costs. Nearly three million homes had installed solar. In the past year, Orbit Energy & Power, a New Jersey-based company, opened new offices in Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, and Florida. Our workforce has grown by multiples, and so has the number of families now generating their own clean American energy with solar systems we’ve installed.
Our solar and battery storage customers love the positive impact we’re making together. And what they love even more is the savings they’re seeing month after month. The solar tax credit makes that possible.
Adding direct-pay to the solar tax credit will allow families to receive the credit even if they owe less in taxes than the credit is worth. This would allow more families with low and moderate incomes to get the same benefit from solar that higher-income families get.
Expanding the solar tax credit to more families would lead to more solar installations. Extending it for ten more years would give solar and energy storage businesses the certainty needed to continue strengthening this vital industry. That strength will continue to create skilled American jobs and ensure solar remains a more affordable alternative to the monopoly electric companies. SEIA predicts the growth of the American solar industry will increase four-fold over the next decade if we get the policy right[3].
Congress will debate our national priorities over the coming days and weeks. We ask our leaders to consider their constituents who benefit from solar: the solar homeowners who have more in our pockets every month, the solar workers who depend on a strong and growing industry for our livelihoods, and the prospective solar families who are waiting for leadership from Washington to step into the future.
Let’s extend the solar tax credit for ten years and add a direct-pay provision so we can share the benefits of solar with even more American families.
Join Orbit Energy and demand congress clean energy policies be included to strengthen America’s infrastructure and economic future.
