With sun almost all year, this is long overdue.
Builder goes solar in Roseville
Lennar will construct 650 homes in its first local project to feature alternative energy.
By Jim Wasserman - Bee Staff Writer
Published 12:00 am PST Wednesday, January 17, 2007
One of the nation's largest home builders is adding substantial corporate muscle to Sacramento's growing visibility in alternative energy, unveiling a plan Tuesday to build 650 solar houses in Roseville.
Miami-based Lennar Corp. said 60 of the houses are under construction in what's being called one of the nation's largest all-solar neighborhoods. They say the climate is just right: Metropolitan Sacramento has about 320 days of sunshine a year.
Lennar, the region's second-biggest home builder in 2006 with more than 1,100 sales, said its three communities in west Roseville mark its first local solar energy venture. The homes in those communities, and in two more nearby beginning next year, will feature built-in rooftop solar panels as standard equipment.
The company's push into solar-powered housing is the first by a major publicly traded home builder in the area. Small private builders account for nearly all of the 300 solar homes built here in recent years.
Statewide, about 2,000 new homes have built-in solar systems, according to the California Energy Commission. The state's biggest solar community has 466 homes in one Orange County neighborhood.
