Jasmine Graham was quoted in the Times Union.

​The Kingston Community Solar program will connect residents to the Moores Hill Community Solar Project, a 3,750-kilowatt solar farm in New Windsor currently being constructed by Lodestar Energy. Community solar credits will be applied directly to participants’ Central Hudson utility bills each month to offset their usage charges. Savings will begin in 2024, once the solar project is operational, and will continue for 20 years, according to the release.

The city projects up to 15 percent savings on monthly electricity bills.

The program is the first phase of Kingston Community Energy, the city’s community choice aggregation initiative. To implement this program, Kingston has partnered with Mid-Hudson Energy Transition, a Kingston-based nonprofit organization, to serve as the community choice aggregation administrator, as well as PowerMarket, a community solar provider. The two companies will oversee community outreach, manage the enrollment process and handle program administration.

“Mid-Hudson Energy Transition is proud to launch the first phase of Kingston Community Energy in collaboration with the city of Kingston. This marks a pivotal step in our mission to provide affordable, renewable energy to everyone, especially underserved communities,” Executive Director Jasmine Graham said in a statement.

Read more here.

Jasmine Graham was quoted in the Daily Freeman.

KINGSTON, N.Y. — City residents living in low-income census tracts will be eligible to receive rebates on 15% of the cost of their energy bill beginning next year, Mayor Steve Noble announced at a press conference outside the Andy Murphy Neighborhood Center on Wednesday.

Noble said that some 6,000 people were eligible for the rebates and the next three months would be spent raising awareness with information sessions and mailer campaigns to get people to sign up. Five hundred spots are available initially, he added.

“Our goal is to ensure that every resident has access to affordable, sustainable energy,” Noble said.

The city’s upcoming community solar energy program will use power sourced from a 3,750-kilowatt New Windsor solar farm to offset the Central Hudson bills of ratepayers in Kingston, in partnership with non-profit Mid-Hudson Energy Transition and solar provider PowerMarket.

Jasmine Graham, executive director of Mid-Hudson Energy Transition, said they were able to negotiate up to a 15% rebate instead of a standard 10%. She said the purpose of the program was”empowering our neighbors to support clean energy and ease the burden of high-energy costs, as we all know too well.”
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She added that the hope was Kingston would eventually run entirely on renewable energy.