On February 7 from 1:00 - 2:30 pm EST, EPA's RE-Powering America's Land Initiative will host a webinar: Decision Trees for Screening Potentially Contaminated or Underutilized Site for Solar and Wind Potential
You can register for the webinar at http://www.clu-in.org/conf/tio/renewableenergyland/.
This webinar will give an overview of two draft decision trees that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) created to screen potentially contaminated and underutilized sites for solar and wind potential. These decision trees were created to guide state and local governments and other stakeholders through a process for screening sites for their suitability for solar photovoltaic (PV) and wind energy. Targeted sites include underutilized "greyfields", commercial/industrial rooftops, brownfields, Superfund sites, RCRA sites, publicly owned facilities, abandoned parcels, and landfills. EPA encourages the development of these targeted sites, instead of green space.
Through the RE-Powering America's Land Initiative, the EPA encourages renewable energy development on potentially contaminated land. The EPA also promotes redevelopment of urban sites to achieve "Smart Growth" objectives. Community vision for the site, as well as the site's key attributes, should shape the redevelopment plan.
These decision trees can be used to screen individual sites for solar or wind potential or for a community-scale evaluation of candidate sites. They are not intended to replace or substitute the need for a detailed site-specific assessment that would follow an initial screening based on criteria contained in the trees. Tips on how users can obtain information relevant to various parameters in the trees are provided.
These draft tools have been posted on EPA's RE-Powering America's Land website athttp://www.epa.gov/renewableenergyland/develop_potential_fs.htm. EPA is seeking your feedback on these draft decision trees. Please send comments by February 16 to Shea Jones at jones.shea@epa.gov