Jobs act is needed

There are many reasons to support the Clean Energy Jobs Act (CEJA) to protect our country and the rest of the world, but this is a personal economic benefit we have had under the precursor to CEJA.

In December we had 21 solar panels activated on our townhouse roof at no cost to us. We didn't have to pay for the panels, nor their installation, nor do we pay for maintenance. We have a 20-year lease and will only pay about half of our prior year's average electric bill on a monthly basis for the length of that lease. Even though electric bills in general will increase over 20 years our usage costs will remain constant.

As part of our installation we can monitor our usage and generation of electrical power at any time. Although January was not a good month for sun, in February we almost generated all of our electrical usage and thus far in March our panels have generated 147% of our usage.

It is so comforting that we are helping to protect the environment for our grandchildren and save money at the same time. CEJA would greatly increase Illinois' opportunity for all citizens to do the same while promoting jobs for clean energy. One of the reasons that we couldn't start benefiting from solar panels before December was that the installation company didn't have enough workers to keep up with the demand. And there are other good jobs in the future for Illinois, like factory jobs to make electric vehicles and batteries. Costs for electric vehicles etc. are declining, but in the meantime we are able to save money. As part of CEJA the state can save money also, by renegotiating a multi-state capacity market.

Cheryl Arevalo

Romeoville