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What We Do
We accelerate access to the benefits of the clean energy economy.
Financing for Developers
The Climate Access Fund is a non-profit green bank that offers two financial products to developers and potential project owners in Maryland who offer meaningfully discounted energy to low-to-moderate (LMI) households:
Financing: CAF offers financing with attractive terms to increase projects’ benefits to LMI households. CAF-financed projects must reserve at least 50% of energy generated for the benefit of LMI households and offer a minimum 20% discount on LMI electricity bills.
Solar Bill Guaranty: Through the generous support of the Maryland Energy Administration, CAF offers a Solar Bill Guaranty to backstop the community solar bills of participating LMI customers, reducing the impact of customer defaults on project revenue and enabling LMI households a longer runway to catch up on bill payment.
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Project Origination: CAF Community Solar Projects
Climate Access Fund originates, develops, and finances commercial scale, community solar projects on rooftops, parking lots, and brownfields in Maryland. CAF’s demonstration project, Solar4Us@Henderson-Hopkins, is located on the rooftop of the Elmer A. Henderson: A Johns Hopkins Partnership School (Henderson-Hopkins), a public contract school in East Baltimore. This project will:
Allocate 100% of clean energy generated for the benefit of an estimated 150 low-to-moderate (LMI) income households;
Enable subscribed LMI households to receive a 20 - 25% discount on their BGE electricity costs;
Save subscribed households $1.1 M over the lifetime of the project;
Offer job training and exposure, local contracting, and local hiring opportunities; and
Provide resources for experiential learning opportunities about solar, clean energy, and climate change for Henderson-Hopkins students;
If you are interested in becoming a site host for a future project or if you have suggestions for potential site, please view our Site Host Information Packet . We are seeking commercial or industrial rooftops, parking lots, and brownfields across Maryland.
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Advocacy for Community Solar
Since its inception in 2018, CAF has been at the forefront of community solar advocacy in the State of Maryland with the goal of expanding low-income households’ access to the economic and environmental benefits of clean energy. CAF has successfully advocated for statewide policies and regulations enabling the expansion of low-to-moderate (LMI) community solar. Key advocacy outcomes include the following:
Represented the interests of low-income households and communities in the MD Public Service Commission’s regulatory process to implement the community solar pilot program enabled by legislation that was passed in 2015;
Initiated HB 76, passed in 2022, creating a personal property tax exemption for certain community solar projects serving low-income households;
Helped to develop and review HB 908, legislation passed in 2022 that made permanent the community solar pilot; and
Was a lead advocate for maximizing the number of low-to-moderate (LMI) income households served, successfully pushing for state green bank funding to serve at least 40% LMI households by law.
These advocacy wins were critical in not only expanding community solar and increasing low-income households’ access to its benefits, but also they have ensured that the state of Maryland is well-positioned to successfully apply for and deploy Greenhouse Gas Reduction Funds specifically designated for LMI-serving community solar projects.