The Massachusetts Clean Energy Center (MassCEC) is pleased to announce the selection of New England Clean Energy as the Solarize Mass installer for the towns of Acton and Shirley. New England Clean Energy will work with the Solarize Mass Community Solar Coaches in each town, to implement the Solarize program in partnership with MassCEC.

"Solar 201" public meetings will be scheduled shortly to introduce the installer to the communities, and answer questions from residents and business owners.

"We were very pleased to participate in the Solarize Mass pilot program last year as the installer for Harvard, which put more solar on rooftops than any other town in the pilot," said New England Clean Energy President Mark Durrenberger. Harvard homeowners signed up for more than 70 solar systems, equal to about 400 kilowatts.

The town of Shirley has several hundred more homes than Harvard, and Acton has 6,000 more, according to 2011 data.

"We hope to match or even exceed the success of Harvard in Acton and Shirley, which both have tremendous community engagement and strong commitments to going green," Durrenberger said.

In April 2012, as part of the effort to reach Governor Patrick's goal of 250 megawatts (MW) of solar power installed by 2017, Energy and Environmental Affairs Secretary Richard K. Sullivan Jr. announced that the Massachusetts Clean Energy Center (MassCEC) and the Department of Energy Resources (DOER) had selected 17 communities to participate in the 2012 Solarize Massachusetts (Solarize Mass) Program, which helps residents and business owners adopt solar photovoltaic (PV) technology.

"Under Governor Patrick's leadership, Massachusetts is the nation's leader in clean energy," said Patrick Cloney, Chief Executive Officer of MassCEC.

"We are seeing tremendous growth of solar PV throughout the Commonwealth and now, with the right policies and programs in place, we at MassCEC are tremendously excited to partner with cities and towns across the Commonwealth to bring clean, locally sourced, cost-effective solar electricity generation to individual residences and businesses throughout the Commonwealth."

Solarize Mass is a program of the Massachusetts Clean Energy Center that encourages the adoption of small scale solar PV by deploying a coordinated education, marketing and outreach effort, combined with a tiered pricing structure that provides increased savings as more people in the community go solar.

MassCEC provides technical support and hosts free educational meetings in the participating communities to educate people about the benefits of installing solar and to drive interest in implementing the technology.

MassCEC, in partnership with the DOER's Green Communities Division has selected the cities and towns of Acton, Arlington, Boston, Hopkinton, Melrose, Mendon, Millbury, Montague, Newburyport, Palmer, Pittsfield, Lenox, Shirley, Sutton, Wayland, Sudbury and Lincoln, to participate in Solarize Mass.

New England Clean Energy, formerly New England Breeze Solar, has put more solar on Massachusetts homes than any other local company. New England Clean Energy designs, engineers and installs solar electric and solar hot water systems, as well as solar attic fans and solar parking lot lighting systems, for homes and businesses.

The Hudson, Mass.-based company has installed more than 180 solar systems throughout Central Massachusetts since being founded in 2006. Mass Solar Info recently awarded the company five honors, including Highest Customer Satisfaction among Massachusetts solar installers.