Vernon, B.C. considering requiring new homes to be built ‘solar ready’

In the future, all new single-family homes in Vernon, B.C. could be required to be built “solar-ready.”

The Okanagan municipality’s city council voted this week to ask staff “to investigate requiring all new single-family homes be built with solar-ready infrastructure.”

What that means in practice is that the homes would need to have conduit or tubing installed so that if solar panels were added in the future it would be easy to connect them to the home’s electrical infrastructure.

It’s something the owner of a Vernon solar installation company said many home builders are already doing.

“It will always depend on the actual build itself, but a conduit itself is quite an inexpensive item. I don’t think it would add more than a couple of hundred dollars to an average install,” said Roost Solar owner Stephen Russell.

Russell is in favour of the proposed “solar-ready” requirement which would make retrofitting houses with solar panels easier.

Russell, though, admits that as someone in the solar industry, he’s “a little biased.”

Councillors in favour of exploring the idea argued mandating solar readiness would support the city’s climate action goals.

“I think that is our job as city council is to be leaders and to make sure we are taking the steps that we are expected to be taking to put the climate plan into action. We are far behind, I think, in terms of where we would like to be. We are doing our very best,” Coun. Teresa Durning said.

“When ideas like this come up it is really important for us at city council to give it a full discussion and give it time to process and I think we are doing that with this item.”

Durning also pointed out that council had discussed potentially offering financial incentives to offset the cost of a “solar-ready” requirement.

However, Coun. Kari Gares is concerned about mandating a new requirement for builders when government is also trying to reduce red tape to get needed housing built.

“I fundamentally don’t have an issue with solar — in fact, solar for a lot of individuals is a huge cost-saving measure,” said Gares.

“My concern that I have is on the flip side of that. If we are  regulating which means we are imposing on the development community a certain aspect of building, is that going to translate into an increased cost to the consumer?”

Gares also points out that not all homeowners will end up using the “solar-ready” infrastructure.

City staff is expected to come back to council with a report on the idea at a future council meeting.