Nearly 10,000 solar projects have participated in New York’s open enrollment solar incentive programs over the past 10 years. The data was made publicly available on Open NY, New York States open data portal. (See Environmental Leader’s story about the initial release of the data for more information and background.) The data was acquired and organized by Vassar student Toscane Clarey as part of a project for GEOG 228 – Web Mapping: Advanced Approaches to Publishing. This project was intended to increase visibility of solar projects in New York State.
The points in the map illustrate aggregated solar installations by zip code (or “City”, as is listed in the pop-up window when clicking an individual point.) The total number of solar projects associated with each point, total nameplate capacity in kilowatt hours (kWh), and the total expected output in megawatt hours (MWh) are also listed in the pop-up window.
Use the zoom buttons (+/-) and pan around the map and explore local installations. Click the button in the upper-left corner [>>] to view the legend, which indicates the aggregated expected output associated with the relative size of the point symbols.
Note that southern New York contains a higher number of installations and output, and that rural areas appear to be under-served.