John McNamara - The Power to Create Equity with Solar

[00:00:00] Dominique: Hello, welcome to another episode of Green Champions.

[00:00:14] Adam: Thanks for joining us in a conversation with real people making real environmental change in the work that they do. I'm here with Dominique, the sustainability expert.

[00:00:22] Dominique: And as always, I am so glad to be here with Adam, the social enterprise extraordinaire. We bring you guests who saw the potential for impact in their job or community and have done something about it.

[00:00:33] Adam: From entrepreneurs to artists, scientists to activists, this podcast is a platform for green champions to share their stories and plant new ideas.

[00:00:42] Dominique: So whether you're tuning in today, maybe while cooking your lunch, maybe you're just taking a really moment of relaxation, your outside your house in the sun, today Adam and I are joined once again by the John McNamara, who hopefully you are just as excited as I am to hear from again. 

Last time we got to hear from John on his time serving as leader of the green team with the Nationwide, taking it from an organization that wasn't super active to something that was a driving force for him and for the community. He also found his place in sustainability. We talked through how he connected, where he found joy with where he was valuable and also just work where the world needs some work. 

John also shared that he went to ASU and found a way to start seeing himself in a C-suite chair. So that's pretty exciting. So we're gonna get to dive deeper into that amazing story of sustainability work, and we'll talk about how John now has a role as COO at ARP, what ARP is actually doing to advance solar and what we should all know about solar. I think that'll be fun to get into. So John, thank you and welcome back.

[00:01:47] John: Well, thank you so much for having me. I absolutely love it. 

[00:01:49] Adam: Can we dive into ARP and tell us what you do?

[00:01:53] John: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So I run operations for Appalachian Renewable Power. Really, for anything that we're doing internally within the organization, I see that as my responsibility. And then our founder- CEO, Gary Easton, is really seeing over the entirety of everything that we do. I'll say that I didn't believe in the power of networking before this role as much as I do now. I was looking for an opportunity to step into a more formal and closer to the front lines of sustainability role and wasn't having a whole lot of success. And I think, you know, last time we talked, we talked a little bit about knowing your superpower and being authentic in what you want to do. 

And I'll be honest, like I probably was missing the mark on that as I was initially looking for that role. I was looking for a role doing the buckets that people told me that I was good at and not the things necessarily that I was excited about doing or passionate about doing. People have said that I'm a sales person through and through that I should be in sales that you gotta sell some charismatic and fun. And like I get that, and at the same time, it's not fulfilling for me. It's not an environment that I like being in. It's not a position that I enjoy doing. And yet because people told me that that's what I should do, I was looking for it. And unsurprisingly, when you're looking for a role that you don't really wanna do, you don't really find it either. So I was struggling to find a place to call home, a place to move into the sustainability role. And very fortunately, I had a friend who worked for EnergySage and was calling out to different solar companies to provide them leads. 

And he happened to call Gary, our founder at ARP and said, "Hey, do you need any leads?" and Gary said, "Leads? I'm drowning in leads. I need people." And I will be forever grateful that Chris said, "Hey, will you maybe talk to my friend John then?" And Gary and I sat down in Dublin for a cup of coffee. I am talking to someone from Appalachian Renewable Power, filling my own head with my own stereotypes that I've cultivated here in Central Ohio. 

And I start to have this conversation with Gary about the birth lottery, about how fortunate we are just to be in the position that we are and what an opportunity and an obligation that is to pay forward and help those out who may not be in the same circumstance. And then he jumped up and opened the door for someone. And I'll tell you, you know, you remember the moments in your life when you fall in love with a person and the natural reflex of it. This wasn't somebody jumping up to help someone open the door, who they were carrying a bunch of boxes. He wasn't doing it to impress me. It was a reflex. And you saw that this is somebody who wants to help folks out. And so I said, "Hey Gary, I don't know what I would do for your organization, but why don't I come down to Athens for a couple days and just observe and see what's going on?" And had the opportunity to go down there, saw a passionate group of people who were working themselves to the bone, who weren't leveraging process or technology to make their lives easier. So an opportunity would come in, the sales person would put it on their Excel spreadsheet. They would put all the information about the customer down and work the lead from that point. If the customer decided that they wanted to sign a contract and move forward, oftentimes the salesperson would hand write out the information to pass over to the operations person. 

[00:05:51] Dominique: Adam is cringing. 

[00:05:53] John: He is. And I felt the same way. And it's those moments where you're an observer and you're like, "I know how to fix this. I know how to fix this," and you're really excited about it. And so I spent two days with them, really saw that there was a lot of inefficiency.

[00:06:09] Dominique: How big was this team? Just curious.

[00:06:10] John: The office team at that point was four folks. Um, it was four folks. It was a salesperson, a construction manager, the operations manager, and the warehouse manager is what we had. And it was people who were unnecessarily suffering while doing an incredible service. There was confusion because there wasn't an ecosystem of work that was going on. So documents would get lost or you'd be uncertain who had a responsibility over something. And so, I went home that night and I put together a PowerPoint presentation because that's where I go. That's my natural space to go to.

[00:06:49] Dominique: You and I are the same.

[00:06:50] John: Yeah, absolutely. And I had the opportunity to present it to Gary and at the end of the presentation there was a slide on there that said, "And if you get me, here's what I come with and here's what I'm gonna bug you about." And I said, "I love unions. I love diversity, equity, inclusion. I love employee stock ownership. These are the things that are important to me and these are the things I will bug you about if I come work with you." And he said, "I have always wanted to do these things. I don't know how to make them happen yet." And I said, "I'm yours." Like, "Let's go now." 

And it has been such a wonderful journey. I walked into the role, I had solar installed on my home in April of that year. So had it for about six months, absolutely fell in love with the technology. I took a very rudimentary course through NABCEP to get my PV Associate, which is just basic 101 of solar. And so I still have a very limited knowledge of solar. But you know who does have a ton of knowledge about solar? Gary. And I have a ton of knowledge about operations and procedures, and he has a ton of knowledge about running a construction site, running a business. And it has just been an absolute, you know, I talk about it being a yin yang, that our strengths and weaknesses just compliment each other so wholly. 

[00:08:26] Adam: What do these projects look like? What sort of solar installations? 

[00:08:31] Dominique: What is a solar installation?

[00:08:33] Adam: And what forms do they take?

[00:08:35] John: Yeah, absolutely. So they, they run the gamut. The most exciting of them is definitely the floating solar. That's the one that we have the most fun with because it involves a company jet ski. So, you know, that's definitely where we're gonna gravitate. But we'll put solar pretty much anywhere. We do residential rooftop solar, ground mounts. We're actually waiting right now to hear back on a grant from the Department of Energy in partnership with West Virginia University on a project that we're calling Agrivoltaics.

This will be the combination of solar PV and cows in the same field. So you actually lift the array up a little bit higher. You put a little bit more robust poles on there but you can have the cows coexist with the solar panels. They love it because they get a little bit of extra shade from it, and you can actually put big sleeves, metal sleeves around the poles. And what they've found is the cows will come up and they'll just rub their back up against it. And so they enjoy having that structure in there. 

[00:09:41] Dominique: Is this something that coexists particularly well with cows, like more than other agricultural animals?

[00:09:47] John: So cows and sheep do really well. Goats do not. Goats will eat the wires and so you have to watch out for goats on there. But cows will do well there, and it's found land. So we're always looking for what are those spaces that are being underutilized? The top of warehouses. You can power something like 60% of our electrical need just off the top of warehouses.

[00:10:15] Adam: Fun fact too. I heard that sheep do really well with solar panels because they're allergic to the copper wires.

[00:10:22] John: That's what I've heard as well, and, and 

[00:10:24] Dominique: How do you know that?

[00:10:25] John: Told that they know it, 

but I, yeah, that's, that's what I'm told is said they're allergic to copper. 

[00:10:30] Dominique: Is this real? Are you both making a joke or are you serious?

[00:10:33] John: Sheep are definitely allergic to copper, and they can coexist with the solar. Whether they know it's there or they're just nice human beings, I guess it would be nice human beings.

[00:10:42] Adam: Nice sheep. 

[00:10:43] John: Nice sheep. They let it be.

[00:10:44] Dominique: I've heard of solar panels going on like bus stops and parking garages. So like I want a visual, like when you say floating, is it like literally the solar panel is light enough to be balanced out by something that literally floats, or is there a pole beneath and it looks like it's floating?

[00:11:01] John: So it is floating. It's on a system that was developed by a company called Ciel & Terre. It's a French company. Big shout out to Alban, who is our representative who came out, taught us how to put this together. Think rubber-made, big rubber made sections, maybe three feet by three feet are the floats. And so, you build a structure with those and they float on the water. You tether it down to the bottom of the lake and then you put your solar panels on top of those floats. So it is above the water. And then we've got a nice long walkway that runs the cables down to the shore where we can interconnect with the utility at that point.

[00:11:45] Dominique: With water being like a big part of the ecosystem, are there pros and cons for the presence of solar on there?

Yeah, Yeah, there are pros and pros and pros. 

Love it. 

[00:11:55] John: So the first pro is that it's found land. It's unused space that you wouldn't have used for anything else. It also reduces evaporation. So when you think about a water treatment plant, what they want to preserve there is the water that they have at the plant. It also cools the solar panels, so solar panels are more efficient when they're cooler. So during the winter, even though there's less sunlight, your solar panels are more efficient because they work better when it's cool, so you get a benefit there as well. And it creates a habitat in the reservoir as well because now feeder fish have a place that they can hide. This reservoir, there's no cover around it, so nothing would come. And so what you see with a floating solar array is that you'll see fish underneath it now. They'll be hiding under there. It'll bring in cranes. Cranes will actually walk through the entire array and fish while they're walking up on the platform. So, pros and pros and pros. It really works out well for a lot of reasons.

[00:12:57] Dominique: And this is just new. Like, is this just not done a lot for a particular reason? 'Cause it just, I'm sitting here being like, "Great. Why isn't it everywhere?" 

[00:13:05] John: Yeah. Well, that's what we all say about all the sustainability solutions.

[00:13:09] Adam: Why isn't this everywhere? 

[00:13:10] John: Hey, that's a smart idea. We should do that everywhere. 

[00:13:12] Dominique: Hey, that's a nice tree. Why aren't you everywhere? Yeah.

[00:13:16] John: So we have installed the first one for Ohio. But there have been many floating solar arrays that have been installed across the United States. And even more predominantly in Asia as well. They have a lot of floating solar arrays that are out there. So, it is becoming more and more of a used technology. 

[00:13:34] Adam: Can you give us a Solar 101 for somebody who doesn't really know the benefits of solar? 

[00:13:38] John: Yeah. Oh my goodness. I love talking, talking solar. So, solar is what I'm gonna call a relatively new technology. And what I mean by that is geologically relatively new, because Edmond Becquerel in 1839, discovered the photovoltaic effect. So this is a technology that has been around for almost 200 years. What it does is it takes the difference between two layers of metal and there is a natural process that happens when the sun hits that, that it releases electrons between the two pieces of metal. And so it will create DC current at the panel level. And people talk a lot about with solar, you know, "I'm gonna invest in this pretty large capital investment on this. How long is this really gonna last for me?" That photovoltaic effect is pretty bulletproof. You know, Gary's got his original system on his house from 1999 and it's still pushing enough energy for him to use it. They are certainly more efficient nowadays. We've developed the technology quite a bit, but the process and the generation of electricity there is a fairly basic mechanism and so it will continue to produce that electricity for a very long time.

There are different components within the system, so there are fail points within it. We talk about inverters a lot, and so what a solar panel creates is DC energy, just like AAA battery. But your house doesn't run on DC energy. So we will have an inverter technology, either a micro inverter at the panel level or a larger inverter where we bring all the DC down from the solar panel, put it into that inverter and convert it over to AC energy. That's where you'll see that fail point but we do have a lot of great equipment manufacturers and I will gush about the Inflation Reduction Act in that moment as well. That is a really powerful piece of legislation that we are only really starting to see the benefits of. Last episode we talked about intersectional environmentalism. 

At the forefront, that's what gets me really excited about the Inflation Reduction Act. The amount of effort that's been put into that piece of legislation to start to heal some of the inequities that we have pushed onto marginalized communities for arguably 400 years are getting corrected within there. 

[00:16:10] Adam: How does that play into solar?

[00:16:11] John: Absolutely. So from the solar side of things, there was a little bit of what I would argue is disappointment in the solar industry because I think folks thought that it would hit my level of the solar industry faster that it would come to the installer. I would argue that this is such a smart piece of legislation that it is actually putting more investment in the beginning into the manufacturer of this equipment and bringing the technology back domestically. China has really owned the solar market for a very long time, and a lot of opportunity to create high paying sustainable jobs for folks out there. And so there are a lot of incentives for manufacture in the first level of the Inflation Reduction Act. And we're actually seeing that Ohio is poised to be the leading manufacturer of solar panels domestically. So that is one of the spaces

[00:17:08] Dominique: Because of key manufacturers or because of we have something to offer, resource wise?

[00:17:12] John: Because of key manufacturers. So we have one of the largest solar manufacturers for commercial level Solar is a company called First Solar out of Toledo. And so they really led the way and because they had some of that specialization in it, a lot of companies have chosen Ohio to try to pull from that talent pool as well.

[00:17:32] Adam: My stomach is just like really excited.

[00:17:34] John: Who isn't? Yeah. Ohio leading solar and panel manufacturing is amazing.

[00:17:40] Dominique: Um, You speak very positively about the world of solar and I know there are people out there who are like, maybe have their qualms about the trajectory of solar or think that maybe other alternatives are better. What are you really proud of when it comes to thinking about where solar is headed and what are you scared of?

[00:18:01] John: So I think I'm most proud about how it brings power to the people that there is an equity to solar and an accessibility to solar that there isn't quite with some other power generation models out there. You know, especially renewable on the renewable side. You know, we get into conversations when we're having sales conversations with folks and saying, they ask, "What's the return on investment? How long is the return on? How long am I gonna be, when is this gonna pay for itself?" And my retort to them is always, "Hey, when is the utility company gonna say, 'Hey, we're square. You don't owe us anything else. We're not gonna send you any more electric bills.'" That's never going to happen. So you have an opportunity to own your own power generation. AEP did a 28% increase on electrical costs at the beginning of last summer. What we see right now, even in this interest rate environment, is that if you decide to take a loan out for your solar project for most folks, we're doing an even swap.

You are getting rid of your electric bill and you're picking up a loan payment where you now own your electricity. And so that's what really gets me excited about it. I won't dog though on other renewable solutions because we need them all. We need wind, offshore wind has had a really tough year from a permitting standpoint. A lot of projects have been put on the back burner. We need that. We need all of these solutions.

[00:19:41] Dominique: One of my good friends likes to say that, " All boats rise together." 

[00:19:45] John: Yeah. 

[00:19:45] Dominique: So it feels very fitting for the world of renewables.

[00:19:48] John: Absolutely. And really in into solar as well. So you will find that, you know, we don't really talk poorly of other solar companies. In Ohio, 99.5% of rooftops don't have solar on them. There's a lot of work to do. Now, the thing that I am concerned about and what I'm not excited about in the world of solar are some of these fly by night organizations. Some of these efforts from larger corporations to spool up a solar division and then they step away from it quickly. Or, you know, some of the utility size installations that we're putting in and we're talking 50 or a hundred megawatts. Enormous solar farms. 

What's going on with those is that these national organizations are coming in, they are hiring people from temp agencies, putting them out there to be laborers and then when that project is over, they disperse those folks. And that's something that's against what we believe at ARP Solar. 

We want to create renewable energy leaders. We want to create careers in this. We have a real passion for the trades and for people to be able to sustain their families, sustain their existence off this opportunity. And especially, you know, a company named Appalachian Renewable Power. A company who's founded in an area of the country where people had been exploited for a long time and left without an option going forward. Were really looking a lot at workforce development. We partner with an amazing solar company called Clean NRG out of Marietta, Ohio. The NRG in their name is for Narcotics Recovery Group. And so the owner of this organization seeks out individuals who may have struggled with substance abuse throughout their life and give them an opportunity to get into a growing industry that has a lot of growth coming up to it.

[00:21:57] Dominique: Beautiful segue into the world of social enterprise, Adam.

[00:22:00] Adam: I love it.

[00:22:01] John: Yeah. And that's the opportunity. What's the trail that we get to leave behind? We've been in contact with the folks at ARCH, which is a reentry program for folks who've been incarcerated, looking to educate them about solar while they're incarcerated, and give them opportunities to train up and be part of what we're doing as they come out and reenter the workforce, reenter society.

[00:22:25] Dominique: That's really exciting. I mean, that's similar to kind of some of the waste stuff too. Like in the waste world, they do a lot of, I mean, it's a complex like initiative to execute, but they do a lot of sorting for compost diversion right now. So waste diversion through composting gets sorted by some individuals that are currently incarcerated and they get a really great pay and access to green jobs in the waste industry. So it is really cool to see sustainability not sitting in a silo and it's at least like spanning a lot of different initiatives and things we need to be seeing get done.

[00:23:00] John: Yeah.

[00:23:01] Adam: Also, I love this undercurrent of the diversity, equity inclusion component of, Hey, yes. You know, there have been initiatives in the past which have bulldozed through and created large divisions and solar is one way to heal that. And it's not just through owning, you know, your energy with the solar company, but in the ways that it's being treated has, hey, career opportunities, helping people who've been affected the most actually get the jobs and support themselves in that. So that's really kind of cool. Magic. I love that.

[00:23:30] Dominique: And I think what is so cool about you as a green champion, which I think speaks to Adam and I's mission with all of this in creating a podcast is sustainability does not look a certain way. Like you didn't need to be a solar expert to advance this thing that you care about and see a lot of potential in. You brought this operation skillset, and that's what we need. We need people who are amazing artists to figure out how that can be an element of creating change. 

[00:24:00] John: It's all sustainability. Everything.

[00:24:06] Dominique: And we just need to all do a good job and then steer that good job towards the world we need to be creating. 

[00:24:12] Adam: I love it, man. Well, one, it sounds really exciting that you've gone and been able to find your place at ARP. I love the kind of overview of the importance of having process inside of, you know, a company, especially a startup where things are typically chaotic. But we covered a lot there. We touched on, "Hey, what do some of these different solar projects look like?" I love the floating solar. That just is so really cool. 

But then really covering all these pieces around equity and how that's affected people, right? And how there's steps being taken within the solar industry to, you know, heal that and take that forward. It's not like we only solve one problem at a time, right? We all come together and it's only together that we can solve these. So the more inclusive that we can be, the greater that change that we can make. 

[00:24:57] Dominique: If you were to leave any advice for someone, maybe that was you 20 years ago, what's something you wish you were told?

[00:25:04] John: Be patient with yourself. I think nowadays we live in a society of instant gratification, and so we're always looking to that next chapter of where we're going to be. I to this day, see myself trying to peek ahead to the next chapter and what it's going to look like. It takes a while and, it's building blocks. And, you know, you asked me about my journey to where I got here, and there's no one aha moment. There's so many little moments of folks that either gave me grace or gave me some knowledge or gave me a chance that led to this moment that I'm just super grateful for. And so now I get to have the obligation to pay that forward and say, " Where can I help somebody get their building blocks to get where they want to be to make their impact positively in this world?"

[00:26:03] Adam: If people wanna find out more about Appalachian Renewable Power, where do they go?

[00:26:07] John: Mm-Hmm. They would go to arp-solar.com. They can find us on Facebook, on Instagram. I'll definitely give a plug for Green Columbus as well, greencbus.org. A great organization doing incredible things. Yeah.

[00:26:24] Dominique: Well, thank you John for what you do every day, for coming join us today. And also just being like a very positive force towards a lot of equitable.

[00:26:32] John: Thank you for this opportunity. This is an awesome conversation. I really appreciate it.

[00:26:37] Adam: Super fun. Well, we're so glad you could be on today. As always, our guests have found a unique way to champion sustainability. We are here to put real names and stories behind the idea that no matter your background, career, or interests, you really can contribute in the fight against climate change.

[00:26:52] Dominique: So if you know a Green Champion that should be our next guest, email us at thegreenchampions@gmail.com. You can also find our shownotes at thegreenchampions.com. Our music is by the Zayn Dweik. Thanks for listening to Green Champions, and we'll be digging into another sustainability success story with another champion in our next episode.

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