What if San Diego blanketed land, reservoirs and buildings its Public Utilities Department owned with solar and used the money it made off that power to subsidize skyrocketing water rates for poorer people?  That’s the idea San Diego City Councilmember Sean Elo-Rivera pitched during an uncomfortable series of debates over raising water rates on San Diegans by 63 percent over the next four years. The Public Utilities department owns 42,550 acres of land – about the size of Washington D.C. It could, in theory, lease that land out to solar developers and help bring down water rates, fix dams or otherwise prop-up a city department key to ensuring water is treated and distributed to 1.4 million people.  

Other water and solar news:

• The Sacramento Bee: Sacramento solar site claimed as ‘bare ground,’ yet thousands of trees at risk