A solar city strategy applied to six municipalities: integrating market, finance, and policy factors for infrastructure-scale photovoltaic development in Amsterdam, London, Munich, New York, Seoul, and Tokyo

Abstract

Policy support platforms like the Feed-in Tariff and the Renewable Portfolio Standard have been very successful in accelerating renewable energy development around the world. Nonetheless, the sustained and consistent transition to a renewable energy future required, e.g., to avoid further climate change, continues to elude societies. To achieve substantial energy transformation, reconsideration of the finance-policy-market interaction is required and is contemplated here by positioning the build-out of a particular renewable energy technology, photovoltaic (PV) energy, as a commitment to infrastructure-scale development. A so-called 'solar city' strategy is analyzed in which large-scale deployment of PV throughout the urban fabric essentially constructs an urban renewable energy power plant by utilizing the vast rooftop real estate available in all cities. The article explores a capital market strategy for practical implementation of urban PV in six case study cities-Amsterdam, London, Munich, New York City, Seoul, and Tokyo. This study demonstrates the substantial potential of the solar city concept in each location and outlines a financing strategy to realize the potential. (C) 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd