The state House has approved a bill to expand Connecticut's green energy.  Danbury Representative David Arconti, chair of the Energy Committee, says it's a comprehensive bill and will lead to more deployment of solar energy.  It would extend existing renewable energy programs including traditional net metering, also the Green Bank's residential solar investment program. 

PURA would be required to do a value of distributed energy resources study.  Arconti says they would need to take the findings of that study and incorporate it into the docket for the successor program for net metering.  He says right now they can only look at tariff structure and instantaneous metering. 

Arconti says it will increase the virtual net metering act from $10 million to $20 million to help clear the queue and get more municipalities the ability to save on energy costs.  He added that the idea is to make the process more competitive like it is with grid-sized procurements.

The Department of Transportation will be tasked with preparing an inventory of land suitable for Class 1 resources installation.  He says ideally in the next 5 years people will see solar panels lining the highways.