Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
Articles 1 - 9 of 9
Full-Text Articles in Law
Solar Rights In The United States, Sara Bronin
Solar Rights In The United States, Sara Bronin
Sara C. Bronin
Solar rights are legal rights needed to ensure that a piece of land has access to sunlight. These rights may be of interest to property owners seeking to undertake a variety of activities: farming, lighting, and clothes drying, to name a few. But perhaps the most economically significant purpose for which solar rights may be utilized is for the purpose of solar collectors. Such devices are used to harness the rays of the sun and transform them into thermal, chemical, or electrical energy. In an era of increasing deployment of solar collectors across the globe, the fair and efficient allocation …
Energy In The Ecopolis, Sara Bronin
Energy In The Ecopolis, Sara Bronin
Sara C. Bronin
Climate change, resource scarcity, and environmental degradation demand a paradigm shift in urban development. Currently, too many of our cities exacerbate these problems: they pollute, consume, and process resources in ways that negatively impact our natural world. Cities of the future must make nature their model, instituting circular metabolic processes that mimic, embrace, and enhance nature. In other words, a city must be a regenerative city or, as some say, an “ecopolis.” So, how to get there—to ecopolis—from here? In this Comment, I propose a partial answer by focusing on certain legal frameworks that must be reenvisioned to enable the …
Peaceful Coexistence: Independent Microgrids Are Coming, Sara C. Bronin, Paul Mccary
Peaceful Coexistence: Independent Microgrids Are Coming, Sara C. Bronin, Paul Mccary
Sara C. Bronin
The growing push for microgrids in the United States over the last five years has generated a lot of excitement. Those worried about our aging transmission and distribution infrastructure hope microgrids can reduce demands on that grid, while increasing reliability. Environmentalists and energy efficiency advocates think microgrids can help us both decrease reliance on fossil fuels and improve the way we utilize waste heat. Academics love the concept, because microgrids—an out-of-the-box approach with far-reaching implications on user-utility relationships—provide great fodder for research and commentary. Perhaps most significantly in this struggling economy, a growing number of companies have invested millions in …
Community-Scale Renewable Energy, Sara C. Bronin, Hannah Wiseman
Community-Scale Renewable Energy, Sara C. Bronin, Hannah Wiseman
Sara C. Bronin
As the movement toward cleaner energy has gained momentum within the United States, a growing number of scholars and policymakers have made the case for community-scale renewable energy: mid-sized energy sources supported by resources pooled from several private parties in close geographic proximity. When built and utilized at the community level, these energy facilities may allow for economies of scale that their owners could not achieve working individually. Individual distributed generation, such as solar infrastructure on the roofs of homes, involves high transaction costs and creates relatively small impacts. At the same time, community-scale renewable energy has advantages over large-scale …
Building-Related Renewable Energy And The Case Of 360 State Street, Sara Bronin
Building-Related Renewable Energy And The Case Of 360 State Street, Sara Bronin
Sara C. Bronin
This Article argues that a well-conceived policy approach to building-related renewable energy (“BRRE”) — that is, renewable energy incorporated into inhabited structures and used by those structures’ occupants — could transform the way we produce and consume energy by maximizing efficiency while simultaneously minimizing energy sprawl. The vast majority of Americans favor renewable energy, at least in concept. Yet private property owners still face significant obstacles in trying to incorporate renewable energy into their projects. This Article analyzes barriers faced by the project team for 360 State Street, an award-winning, mixed-use LEED® Platinum building in downtown New Haven, Connecticut. Among …
Solar Rights For Texas Property Owners, Sara C. Bronin
Solar Rights For Texas Property Owners, Sara C. Bronin
Sara C. Bronin
In response to Jamie France's note, A Proposed Solar Access Law for the State of Texas, Professor Bronin urges future commentators to focus on three additional areas of inquiry related to proposed solar rights regimes. Bronin argues that such proposals would be strengthened by discussion of potential legal challenges to the proposals, related political issues, and renewable energy microgrids. Ms. France’s proposal for the State of Texas includes the elimination of preexisting private property restrictions that negatively affect solar access. Bronin argues that this proposal would be strengthened by a discussion of potential challenges under federal and state takings clauses. …
Curbing Energy Sprawl With Microgrids, Sara Bronin
Curbing Energy Sprawl With Microgrids, Sara Bronin
Sara C. Bronin
Energy sprawl - the phenomenon of ever-increasing consumption of land, particularly in rural areas, required to site energy generation facilities - is a real and growing problem. Over the next twenty years, at least sixty-seven million acres of land will have been developed for energy projects, destroying wildlife habitats and fragmenting landscapes. According to one influential report, even renewable energy projects - especially large-scale projects that require large-scale transmission and distribution infrastructure - contribute to energy sprawl. This Article does not aim to stop large-scale renewable energy projects or even argue that policymakers focus solely on land use in determining …
Modern Lights, Sara Bronin
Modern Lights, Sara Bronin
Sara C. Bronin
This Article functions as a companion to a piece, Solar Rights, recently published in the Boston University Law Review. In that piece, the author analyzed the absence of a coherent legal framework for the treatment of solar rights - the rights to access and harness the rays of the sun. The growing popularity of, and need for, solar collector technology and other solar uses calls for reform. Answering the call for reform in Solar Rights, this Article proposes a framework within which a solar rights regime might be developed. First, as a baseline, any regime must recognize the natural characteristics …
Solar Rights, Sara C. Bronin
Solar Rights, Sara C. Bronin
Sara C. Bronin
The rights to access and to harness the rays of the sun - solar rights - are extremely valuable. These rights can determine whether and how an individual can take advantage of the sun’s light, warmth, or energy, and they can have significant economic consequences. Accordingly, for at least two thousand years, people have attempted to assign solar rights in a fair and efficient manner. In the United States, attempts to assign solar rights have fallen short. A quarter century ago, numerous American legal scholars debated this deficiency. They agreed that this country lacked a coherent legal framework for the …