Why should we care about the Public Service Commission (PSC)? Because they set how much you pay for power and they choose the type of power generation our state uses (i.e. coal vs. solar).
Many thanks to our friends for these amazing videos.
If you want to learn more about Energy Burden – check this out: Georgia’s Energy Burden
Southern Environmental Law Center has many great resources about the PSC here: Resources for engaging at the Georgia Public Service Commission
For Lower Power Bills, Solar Could Be Here Now
If you have not voted in Georgia’s PSC election yet, here is the link to the My Voter Page, where you can enter your name, county, and date of birth to get a sample ballot, your early voting sites (through Oct. 31), and your Nov. 4 voting location: https://mvp.sos.ga.gov/s/
To research the candidates, here are their website links: Tim Echols, Peter Hubbard, Alicia Johnson, and Fitz Johnson.
The solar installations this video depicts over a MARTA park and ride lot, an Amazon distribution hub, a Google data center, and a popular shopping center are all imaginary for now, as is any document called “Georgia’s Better Power Plan.”
The startling facts about the explosive growth of solar electricity are from Bill McKibben’s 2025 book, Here Comes the Sun, p. 2-3. (You can also find them in this excerpt on the Science Friday website.) Google Earth’s ruler tool provided the acreage of Emory’s Fishburne solar canopy and the prospective solar sites (saved in this .kmz file). An Emory University web page gives the rated capacity and average annual kilowatt-hours (kWh) of Emory’s solar sites, including the Fishburne canopy. (There is more about the Emory solar on Cherry Street’s website.) A Science for Georgia webpage quotes “Georgia Power’s estimate of 1 MW [megawatt] for 450 homes.”
These figures led to the other numbers in the video. (Dividing Fishburne’s 689,000 annual kWh by 8,760 hours in a year gives 79 kW or 0.079 MW. That number multiplied by 450 gives 35 homes*.) The Fishburne per-acre ratios allowed number of homes and rated capacity to be calculated for all the prospective solar sites.
The narration mentions Georgia’s current production of “several gigawatts [GW] of solar panels per year.” This October 2023 article describes the completion of a QCells expansion which will bring the company’s annual Dalton, GA solar panel production to 5.1 GW and construction in progress of a Cartersville plant that produce 3.3 GW per year. The narration also states that “Georgia also is emerging as a producer of batteries” which remains true despite the cancellation of one plant and a widely reported ICE raid on another.
The video makes the point that solar can be installed at scale close to where electricity is most used. This can be validated by anyone who takes a few minutes with Google Maps satellite view.
In this way the video demonstrates a better plan for supplying new electricity. Of course, in addition to supply, there are many other aspects to a plan that could be compared against the Integrated Resource Plan the PSC unanimously approved in July. Perhaps someone will develop such a document soon.
*The narration uses the phrase ”at least 35 homes” because PSC candidate Peter Hubbard stated on David Roberts’ Volts podcast, “That’s a subtle thing that is often not caught, that the average customer is more like 1,100 kilowatt-hours [per month, or 13,200 kWh per year].” Dividing 689,000 by 13,200 gives 52 homes. The more conservative calculation is used throughout the video.
Credits:
This video is an all-volunteer effort. Thanks to:
Writer/Producer: Bill Witherspoon Narrator: Bettye Harris
Sign holders: Mary James, Bob James, Sean McNealy, Tara Overzat Drone camera: Scott Harris
Phone camera: Bill Witherspoon, Jerry Tokars
Additional volunteers seen on camera: members of Citizens Climate Lobby, Congregation Bet Haverim Atlanta, and Sunrise Emory
Music: “Be Here Now” by Ray LaMontagne, performed by Chorus and Strings of Congregation Bet Haverim. Arrangement, vocals and guitar by Will Robertson; backup vocal by Gayanne Geurin. Published on the 2021 album, Red Thread.
How the Public Service Commission Works
by Hank Green
How we do electricity in this country is very weird and kinda boring, but it’s not actually that hard to understand.
Early Voting Info: https://georgia.gov/vote-early-person