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Aerial view of 366 AllEarth Solar Trackers at the 2.2 megawatt Claire Solar Farm in South Burlington, VT.
Riding the ‘Solarcoaster’ Engineer-turned-entrepreneur David Blittersdorf is thriving in Vermont, where the market in renewable energy has a long-term horizon.
By RICHARD MASSEY Managing Editor W hen the most recent U.S. Clean Tech Leader- ship Index came out this spring, a host of fa- miliar states appeared in the Top 10 – California, Massachusetts, Oregon, and New York. Several things happened in the last few years to create an enticing market for renewable energy in Vermont. But little Vermont, just the 49th largest state in the country, appeared at No. 3 on the index, which measures clean technology, policy, and capital. The seventh annual index, created by San Francisco- based Clean Edge Inc., touted, among other things, Vermont’s big gains in wind and solar power, its number of charging stations for electric vehicles, and its progressive state-level legislation.
“Vermont is the big story of the Top 10,” the index says. While the news is certainly good, it’s not surpris- ing to someone like mechanical engineer and entre- preneur David Blittersdorf, a Vermont native who built his first turbine when he was just 14 years old. The founder and CEO of AllEarth Renewables, Inc. , a producer of the Solar Tracker, a panel that follows the sun throughout the day, says several things happened in the last few years to create an enticing market for renewable energy in Vermont. A Comprehensive Energy Plan, a Renewable Port- folio Standard, and net metering created the per- fect climate for innovators like himself. It also helped that in 2014, the Vermont Yankee Nucle- ar Power Plant, at the time the state’s largest pro- ducer of electricity, closed down, leaving an energy void that had to be filled. “Those things came together to create quite a mar- ket in renewables,” Blittersdorf says. Blittersdorf ’s company has fared well, growing to
David Blittersdorf, Founder and CEO, AllEarth Renewables
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