June 2018

122 123 SULLIVAN SOLAR POWER and we stick to proven design and installation practices which result in systems that perform as expected.” Just as important to the company’s contin- ued success is its consistent adherence to the ever-evolving legal and regulatory landscape in the solar industry. “Over the past year or two, the solar market has changed substantially in the State of California, and many people don’t really understand what that means for the technology that needs to be deployed over the next few years,” Sullivan says. “In the past, you would install a solar powered system on the roof, produce energy, and reduce or elimi- nate your bill based on how much energy the system produced compared to how much you consumed. But the utility regulators in the State of California have changed rate structures, and now, rather than being billed on how much en- ergy you use, and being charged more if you use more energy, you’re also going to be charged on when you use energy. “Therefore, it’s important to have a system with storage incorporated into it so that you can minimize the amount of energy you’re using at certain times of the day when energy is most expensive. This has been our focus over the past year, and will remain in the coming years, which makes these installations much more compli- cated and much more involved on the design side to make sure that we get it right.With that reasoning incorporated into our systems, we’re now moving towards a new world order in the solar industry where we’re likely to see people being able to completely disconnect from the grid in the next two or three years. That’s going to be the major evolution in the energy market, and it’s going to cause quite a bit of disruption.” “We’re solar advocates for our customers,” Sul- livan continues. “We’re members of the Interna- tional Brotherhood of Electrical Workers –we’re a union shop, which in the solar space is nearly unheard of. I only know of two other companies in the State of California that use union labor. So, we engage with them on certain policy issues.We also are members of CALSSA– the California Solar + Storage Industry Association (previously the California Solar Energy Industries Association). CALSSA has been a phenomenal organization to protect the interests of people who have chosen to go solar.We coordinate with CALSSA on any policy objective that we’re