Archived News Release: September 17, 2020 - The City of Ann Arbor, in partnership with Community Action Network, Homeland Solar and Left Coast Fund, is hosting a ribbon cutting ceremony on Friday, Sept. 18 at 3 p.m. to celebrate the launch of the city's first resilience hub at Northside Community Center, 809 Taylor St. The ribbon cutting ceremony will take place at Northside Community Center and will include remarks from Ann Arbor Mayor Christopher Taylor and Derrick Miller, executive director of Community Action Network. Tours of the facility will also be available for interested parties as long as individuals are wearing masks and appropriate physical distancing is practiced.
The Northside Community Center and Resilience Hub features a 23kw solar system that includes both rooftop and ground-mounted solar, two lithium-ion batteries, and an informational kiosk that displays details about the system. Once operational, the system will provide nearly 100% of the electrical needs for the center, and the batteries will provide up to three days of power in the case of a power outage. Northside Community Center serves as the administrative building for Community Action Network (https://www.canwashtenaw.org/) as well as a local community center where local food distribution and other services and activities take place.
The work for this project was funded through a grant provided by the Solar Moonshot Program, funded by Left Coast Fund and managed by Hammond Climate Solutions (https://www.hammondclimatesolutions.com/) along with support from the city through a Sustaining Ann Arbor Together Grant (http://www.a2gov.org/sa2t). This project is part of the city's unanimously adopted A2ZERO Carbon Neutrality plan, which outlines a path for how the entire Ann Arbor community can achieve a just transition to community-wide carbon neutrality by the year 2030.
From November 2019 until March 2020, the City of Ann Arbor, in collaboration with more than 65 partner organizations, hosted dozens of public events, conducted online public engagement, worked with four technical advisory committees, administered three public surveys, reviewed dozens of peer reviewed and technical documents and consulted with peers around the nation to develop the A2ZERO Carbon Neutrality Plan, which was unanimously adopted by City Council on June 1, 2020. To learn more about the city's carbon neutrality work, visit www.a2gov.org/sustainability.
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