Mryia Williams - Your Guide to Solar and EVs

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

[00:00:13] 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.

[00:00:21] Dominique: And I'm so glad to be here alongside Adam, the social enterprise extraordinaire. We bring you guests who saw the potential for impact in their job or community and did something about it.

[00:00:30] Adam: From entrepreneurs to artists, scientists to activists, this podcast is a platform for green champions to share their stories and plant new ideas.

[00:00:37] Dominique: So whether you're tuning in just sitting at home, or maybe you're on a walk, today Adam and I are joined by Mryia Williams. She is the Ohio Program Associate for Solar United Neighbors. It's a national nonprofit that helps people go solar and fight for fair energy policies. Mryia is also the Executive Director for Drive Electric Columbus, which is a nonprofit organization that offers education and outreach about electric vehicles and EV infrastructure. So if you have questions about electric vehicles, Mryia is the one to ask. 

[00:01:07] Dominique: And today we're gonna approach sustainability from the topics of electric vehicles, solar, and what it really means to make these sustainable transitions accessible to everyone. So thanks for joining us today, Mryia. We're so glad you're here.

[00:01:18] Myria: Yeah, thank you so much for having me.

[00:01:20] Dominique: Alright, so what is Solar United Neighbors? Tell us about that.

[00:01:23] Myria: So Solar United Neighbors is a national nonprofit. We started back in 2007. Our executive director of our organization, her name is Anya, and she has a son who saw An Inconvenient Truth by Al Gore. And he came home all enthused about it and was like, "Mom, let's go solar." And she was like, "Sure, sounds great." And then she realized, like in the DC area, there was a ton of red tape to doing that. That it was very expensive and it wasn't something that she could just do as easy as she thought she should be able to. 

[00:01:52] Myria: And so she was like, "If we're doing this, there's probably other people that want to do this." And so they went door to door and their neighborhood and found 50 other homes that wanted to go solar with them. And so they took all of those homes solar at once, going through the red tape together, getting a bulk purchase price from an installer and everything else. And once she'd done it once, everybody started hearing about it and asking, "How can you do this in our neighborhood? How can this be replicated?" And so now we're in 12 states. We're doing pilot projects in two other states. And then we have the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico also on board. So we have teams a little bit everywhere around the country. 

[00:02:29] Adam: Wow, cool. How long have you been doing this?

[00:02:31] Myria: So I went through the co-op process, not as an employee, but just as a volunteer, as a normal everyday resident in 2020, which was a great year to have lots of contractors in and out of your house, as you can imagine. So we went through the process here in Columbus like four years ago. And then after that, whenever they started looking for help in the area, I started volunteering with them and I started being employed by Solar United Neighbors about three years ago. I worked in a contract role on a piece of policy to help HOAs and condo associations be able to have better solar access. And then I started full-time in January of '22.

[00:03:08] Dominique: Can you walk us through the contrast of what you understood about solar when you first started exploring it for yourself versus what you thought about it when you had done that project?

[00:03:18] Myria: Yeah. So, I knew very little to nothing whenever I came into it. I went from being like a stay at home mom. But my daughter was off to college, so I was just a stay-at-home cat mom. Um, little bit more casual than most folks. We had one electric vehicle at the time and I was like, "Why are we paying AEP to make our fuel?" I see that there's solar panels out there that we could make our own fuel at home. And so we started investigating it. My husband went to DeVry. He had schooling to be an electrical engineer, so he knew a lot more about it. 

[00:03:50] Myria: But I was like, "All right, let's translate this to like normal human words and help me understand it and what it would mean and what we need." And then we started exploring solar at the end of 2018. But we found that it was like Anya had found- it was very expensive that every proposal we got was very different from each other. That they would range from 20 panels on our roof to 50 panels, that they were small scale arrays to larger ones. Some of them offered batteries, some of them didn't. And we were like, "What exactly do we need and how do we compare these whenever they don't look like each other on bids?" And then we heard about the co-op process and we were like, "Well, that looks like a simpler way to do this. And you have got support, why don't we try that?" So.

[00:04:35] Adam: Very neat. 

[00:04:36] Myria: Yeah. 

[00:04:37] Adam: Well, and it's always been very interesting to me, like you get the people coming up to your door saying, "Hey, here's my proposal for solar with this one company." And I've always found that to be very overwhelming. Like how does the co-op process actually differ from that?

[00:04:50] Myria: Well, so for the record, having solar does not stop those people from knocking on my door.

[00:04:54] Adam: So they see the solar panels, they still come? 

[00:04:56] Myria: Mine are all front facing. So I have 18 on my south facing roof, which is my main part of my house. And then 12 on each side of my garage for a total of 42 panels that are all facing the street, and they will still come and knock and be like, "We'd like to put solar on your roof." I'm like, "Did you look up before you approached the house?" You know, we can put it on the back. I'm like, "No"...

[00:05:18] Dominique: And you're wearing your solar t-shirt...

[00:05:19] Myria: Yeah, no, I have answered the door and And I'm like, "What are you here for, nice guy on my porch?"

[00:05:25] Adam: Just as a side note, if you're listening to this, Mryia is wearing, 'Solar is my superpower,' a bright shirt. She is just shining in here. 

[00:05:32] Myria: We have a thing at SUN for yellow shirts and so we tend to wear them a bit of everywhere. I have all different themes of 'em. We give 'em out to volunteers. So come out and help me with something, we'll get you one. 

[00:05:43] Myria: But yeah. So how does the co-op process work? So, here in Columbus, the city organizes them with us. They sponsor them because they see a lot of those door knockers. Those folks are very aggressive sometimes, and they have sales tactics that aren't necessarily what people should be doing. If they're coming to you instead of you going to them, I'm always like, that's a big turnoff. Don't sign with them. But the city just kept seeing that they had more and more of these door knockers and people being taken advantage of, that the companies are from outta state. They're just hiring sales folks. They don't have boots on the ground. They don't know the local issues and the local rules. And so they approached SUN and said, "Hey, we see you guys have a co-op process that helps with consumer advocacy and education. We would love for that to be available for our residents." And so we started working with the city. 2020, we had the first big co-op here. '21, they were an actual official partner with us. So we have them involved with every step of the way. So, you know, it's a good, good group. Whenever the Mid-Ohio Regional planning commission is part of our partner organizations and then the City of Columbus. 

[00:06:47] Myria: So we work with them and we go out and we do 101's, we call them. So they're like a solar basics class. We go over everything from like, what is solar? How does it work? What are all the other pieces of equipment? Everybody knows about those panels, but there's obviously more to it. They don't just beam the energy into your house. You've gotta have wires and inverters and all these other pieces to make that solar work that way. We go across that then we talk about different financing methods about what the pricing should look like. And then if people want to go solar with our program, we have what we call a bulk purchase. 

[00:07:21] Myria: So we have all these local organizations bid. We send out about 150 to 200 requests for proposals from local solar installers. And then they can choose if they want to participate or not. And then they'll put in like a full bid that shows their panel price, their inverter price, their labor, what their different policies on things are. We collect all their business licenses and electrical licenses and things so that people can see that these are valid companies. We put all of that together on a spreadsheet and then all the members of that co-op come together on a night. They look over all that and they select one of them. And that way that business knows that they're getting a ton of installs all at once and they can order all the supplies at once and then pass that bulk pricing onto the group. 

[00:08:06] Myria: So we're just kind of the guys there educating and bringing it all together. We're not on that contract with you, that's between you and the installer, but, you know. 

[00:08:14] Dominique: That's amazing. So is that very first step for the homeowner to attend the 101 session?

[00:08:19] Myria: Um, they don't have to attend a 101. Some people feel like they know a lot about solar on their own. They can watch, we have virtual recordings of it, so that if they're on a different type of schedule or they just don't like people and they don't wanna come out and see me in person, that they don't have to. But yeah, they can go through that or they can just register on the website and read about it and sign up. So we've got solarunitedneighbors.org/columbus. Take 'em straight into the page for anything Central Ohio. So Franklin County and then any of the six or seven or whatever it is, counties that touch. So like Fairfield Union, Madison, Licking, I'm sure I'm forgetting, Pickaway, a couple, Delaware.

[00:08:58] Dominique: Then, and then that, that process you outlined, that journey that you were talking through of like evaluating the spreadsheets and making your choice and everything, what's the timeline usually on that part of the process?

[00:09:08] Myria: So it takes us about four to six weeks to get enough people in from the start of a co-op whenever it launches through to having this 30 to 50 people that are all in at once to have the selection committee. So we're coming up on the selection committee on June 12th. We'll have that for this group and then everybody can still keep registering. They just wouldn't get to be part of selecting it. They would know who the installer was already. They can read over it and see if they think that feels right to them. But they can join through the end of August. 

[00:09:36] Myria: So it's about a four month window that we have things open for people to participate in, and then we close it down so that the installer can order all of that stuff at once. And it takes anywhere from a month to six months then for the installs to happen. It just depends on how many people, how large of a crew that installer has available, what supply chain issues there are. We still deal with that sometimes.

[00:09:58] Dominique: That's amazing. You're really alleviating the burden for the residents on why this stuff can feel very daunting.

[00:10:03] Myria: Yeah. 'Cause I mean, it's confusing even sometimes for those of us inside the industry 'cause you know, there's new products all the time. So they're coming at you and they're like, "I'm gonna use these, I'm gonna use these." And you're like, "Wait a minute, let me go read the spec sheets, see how that compares." And so we're, especially that spreadsheet. I love it because it shows everything from, you know, how many local jobs they've done to what their hiring process is, their workers' comp, what their fair pay type rules are for their organization to the exact price per watt. So that way you would know going in, you know. Okay, this guy's got a little bit higher price, but he's got five years more warranty and that's important to me. And that way we can let everybody help have a vote in that and see what they rate is important. 

[00:10:45] Adam: So, when people come to Solar United Neighbors and they've never been exposed to solar before, what are some of the things that surprise them the most about installing solar?

[00:10:53] Myria: Um, so they come in with questions from the basics. Like, how much space do I need on my roof for solar to some very interesting mistruths for us. We get to myth bust a lot. You know, "Do you have to take your solar panels down when it rains?" That's a no. You get to leave them up all the time. They're weather resistant, you know? 

[00:11:12] Myria: Or "Will it kill all my plants because it's going to suck up all the sun?" And I'm like, "That's also not how that works," I'm like, " It's a solar panel. It's passive. It just collects the energy that hits it. It is not going to run around the yard. It's not a black hole. It's gonna sit there and just only collect the sun that would normally hit your roof. "

[00:11:30] Myria: So they start with questions like that to bigger questions. Like if I had a DC charger for my car, can't I just use the DC, the direct current energy coming straight off of the panels to charge it and not have to go through the inverter and turn it into AC and then back out to the, and I'm like, "You do not have a DC charger in your house. That is a fast charger. They cost like a hundred thousand dollars. Those are the installations we see at Walmart or Target or somewhere like this along the highway. We do not see those in your garage. So you do have to convert your energy just like everybody else." 

[00:12:06] Myria: So you know a lot about energy and you speak a lot about just like how this stuff works for so many people who have questions. What is your background in?

[00:12:15] Myria: Well, I have absolutely no background in this. So, um, I started off back in 2017, we saw an ad in the newspaper talking about, the dispatch ran this article saying, AEP is running $10,000 off of a Nissan Leaf if you go buy now. And I was like, "We need a new commuter car. How about an electric one?" And three days later, we had an electric car in our driveway. That was enough for us to know that there was that federal tax credit of $7,500 at the time, and then this $10,000 instant rebate that we were going to be able to get a new vehicle in our driveway for 15,000 that was going to meet our commuter needs.

[00:12:54] Myria: And so, you know, it was fun. We had this little electric car, we were like, "Hey, where do we find charging?" "Are there other people driving these?" And so we went to an EV meeting that somebody was having, and I was like, "Well, this is like, we got ourselves a whole little cool, nerdy car group. Let's start going to this." 

[00:13:12] Adam: The years roll by and we start into 2019. And in January, my grandpa was hit by a fracking truck killed. And I was like, instantly, I'm like, "I want rid of natural gas in my house. I want rid of big oil. I don't want any part of this anymore. So your grandfather's death really kicked off?

[00:13:34] Myria: Absolutely. Yeah. This took out a family member in a very direct way, not the way most people think about, you know? he happened to live in Rural Ohio. I'm in the southeastern portion of our state, and so I had a three hour drive each way, every time I was dealing with anything for the estate. 

[00:13:49] Myria: And that whole six hours, I was just sitting there stewing in the fact that, you know, big oil and gas took out a relative. And I was like, "I am going to be part of the change. I'm not going to keep sitting here and being passive in what they're doing to my world." And so, we decided in March of that year, we really started looking at adding a second electric vehicle so that we could eliminate gasoline in our house. We had already picked up an electric lawnmower. And so, April 22nd, Earth Day of 2019, we made a trip to Washington DC and picked up a Kia Niro Electric.

[00:14:20] Myria: So we left behind a rental car and drove home and like, we were featured on a different electric vehicle, like article site. And they said, "They drove it, like they stole it." And we felt a little bit like that because Kia had a no sales clause for Ohio at the time, along with several other states because we don't have any type of incentives for electric vehicles, they didn't see that there would be a market for them. So a lot of electric vehicles at the time were not available in our market. So we had to go to somewhere like DC that was about the closest place that had them available. And so we went there, picked it up, brought it home. 

[00:14:56] Myria: We had it out in two Earth Day car shows within like 12 hours of getting it back into the state. And so, we were out in the community with it and we just kept going out further and further. And so, we were then driving electric all the time, which was maybe not quite as convenient then as it is now. There's still very limited infrastructure in some of our rural areas of the state, but it has built out into our metroplexes really well. But I would drive it all the time putting a thousand miles plus some weeks onto the vehicle and we just, we kept growing what we were doing. And so I was like, "Well, if we've got two electric cars and electric lawn equipment and we're electrifying appliances, I want solar on the roof now." We're gonna go from like, "This might be cute" to "Now, we're definitely doing it." And so at the end of the year we happened to meet up with Solar United Neighbors at an event we were running. We were helping with an electric car show down in Athens. 

[00:15:49] Dominique: Were you doing that as Drive Electric?

[00:15:51] Myria: Sort of. We had only started thinking that we might want to be in charge of the group at that point. So, the group was originally started as part of the Drive Electric Ohio Initiative. And there were six groups across the state. The Athens Group being the very smallest. They're up to, I think 6 or 10 members now, with electric vehicles. So they're taking a little longer to adopt to it than we are here in Central Ohio.

[00:16:14] Myria: But they wanted to have a car show at the Pawpaw Festival. And so we were like, "Hey, we can, our car has the range to go down to Athens," so off we went for the day. And Solar United Neighbors was there too, and a lot of other ecological groups. And so we were in this whole little eco village together in the corner of the Pawpaw Festival. And I was like, "Hey, Solar folks. How do you simplify this?" And so I started learning about the co-op process and I was like, "Do you ever work in Columbus?" And they weren't yet at the time. And I was like, "We should talk about it." And so the Drive Electric Columbus Group signed on as a partner organization for that very first 2020 co-op here in town. And then I got to go help speak and launch that event, that co-op, just saying, you know, "Hey, we wanna go solar to fuel our vehicles and to fuel our house. Does everybody else wanna go solar? How about we bridge these gaps and help make it easier for everybody?" That was kind of where we started merging all those technologies together.

[00:17:12] Dominique: Do you tend to see that people make a similar transition that you did from like electric vehicle then to solar? Do you see that usually?

[00:17:19] Myria: So it's about a 50% crossover rate that if people have an EV that they're like, "Hey, I wanna get solar on my roof 'cause I can make my own energy, then why would I buy it it from somebody else?" You know, you're not, I always say it's like renting your electric, right? Because every month that bill just keeps coming at you. And with solar, you've bought it. It's one price, you're out the door and then you just get to keep making energy for 25, 30 years, you know? 'Cause that's what the warranties on the panels are and they'll make energy even longer than that. So you've bought into this energy, you know? And then the people that have solar on the roof, the minute they start thinking about it, they're like, "Why am I buying gas and paid for my solar? Why don't I just put that solar into my car?" And then they wanna adopt too. So it's a pretty high conversion rate.

[00:18:06] Adam: That's super cool.

[00:18:07] Dominique: If electric vehicles are like the key entry point for a lot of people into this space, what do you think is the most helpful information for someone usually to make that switch of like, why do they choose EVs? What information usually helps them understand that this is a good choice for them?

[00:18:22] Myria: So with EVs, I think that part of what they see and think of is that they want to have that lower cost of maintenance. I have had to on my car that's at about 12,000 miles now, I've had to put windshield washer fluid in and rotate the tires. There's no oil changes, there's no belts. You know, I haven't had to do any other maintenance. 

[00:18:43] Myria: So we're talking like a $30 tire rotation and a $2 jug of blue juice for the windshield washers. That's it. Which I don't even know what a gallon of gas costs anymore. I haven't filled up a car in like seven years. That is just a foreign concept in my mind. I know that whenever I go home, I'll plug my car back in 'cause it's a nice sunny day and my solar will fuel up my car, so I won't have any cost for that. Even if I had to pay an electric bill, would it be 12 cents a kilowatt hour times the size of my battery somewhere around $8 to fill up my vehicle. So, that's a whole lot less expense than it would be to put gasoline in it. So there's a big margin for savings that people like to have. And then, the environmental factors for the people that care about big oil or clean air or clean water, or just want an inhabitable planet in 50 years.

[00:19:36] Dominique: Crazy, a crazy idea. 

[00:19:37] Myria: I know, it's a novel concept, you know, breathing is not important. You know, we don't need, we don't need to be able to do that. 

[00:19:44] Myria: You know, everybody's like, "Oh, the money", and I'm like, "Yeah that's great", but you can only hold your breath so long.

[00:19:49] Adam: You've spoken a bit about Drive Electric, but can you tell us a little bit about what the mission is and what you do with them?

[00:19:55] Myria: Yeah. So Drive Electric Columbus is 100% volunteer led. We have no paid folks. We're an independent non-profit organization. We don't collect donations from anybody on a monetary front. And all of our membership items are free and available to anybody. So if you're just enthusiastic about electric vehicles, if you own one, if you lease one, if you think you heard of one, but you don't know anything more about it, we welcome you out to our events to get materials from us or just to come sit in our cars, touch them, see that they're real. We have ride and drive events sometimes where we'll take people out in our vehicles or let them go drive around in our vehicles with one of us in so that they can see them. 

[00:20:35] Myria: And we're typically out there just as individuals with our cars so there's nobody trying to give you like, really heavy sales pressure because we want to take our car home at the end of the day. We're not trying to sell it to you. So it's really nice for that. 

[00:20:49] Myria: And then we also make sure that we're always going into ' the EVs are for everyone,' kind of thought. That it's not just something for, you know, Dublin Knights to have. It's not just something for the people in Bexley to have. That we want to make sure that these are for the people that live in Linden as well, that they have access and information available to them. 

[00:21:09] Myria: One, they used EV tax credits, how those are now available at $4,000 for a car that's priced under 25,000 and is two years or older, that we want to make sure that they know that they're living within like a Justice40 Zone, that they would qualify to have money back one than EV supply unit, the chargers for their cars within their house, that there are tax credits for them on that and how they could access those tax credits. We just wanna make sure that everybody has an equal opportunity to get to that information because not everybody does.

[00:21:41] Dominique: And I remember feeling really excited to hear that like even just those who were interested in having an EV at some point, like could be part of the group. What is the demographic of just the community you've put together when you think about Drive Electric?

[00:21:53] Myria: So we have a broad range of folks. We have a bunch of going to be first time owners someday, and they ranging from kids that come up. We have a couple of us that collect those Matchbox cars at the store so whenever we're out and about, if we see like the little Tesla Matchbox or the Ford F-150 Lightning matchbox. We'll buy every one of them that we see and then we donate them to the group so that we can put every child that comes up to our table in their first EV. And we just hand them one. You know? Yeah, that way they have that attachment to it.

[00:22:21] Myria: So we have those kind of folks in our group clear up through to retirees that have the time and the means available to come out and help with events during the day whenever the rest of us are having to work or we have just a bunch of people in the middle of there, you know, that they have jobs and they'll take vacation time to come help us with events during the day. They'll take weekends and give up their free time to come out to do this just because they're passionate about their vehicles as well and they wanna share those with people.

[00:22:48] Adam: I just love this like, so we've talked about Solar United Neighbors and a lot of the details behind that. We spoke about Drive Electric and a lot of the stories in between, which is so exciting. How do people best find these organizations and connect with the work that you're doing? 

[00:23:02] Myria: For Solar United Neighbors, we're on all the major social media platforms. So you can find us searching on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, X, whatever it's called now. Instagram, There's this big community on like Reddit as well that'll talk about solar and different things. And then of course our website. So that's solarunitedneighbors.org 'cause we're an organization so you can find every material in there. 

[00:23:26] Myria: So if you've got questions about solar or battery backup, we've even got some EV information on that website, or your local municipality if you're wanting to see if they have a program. If you type that in the search bar, it'll help you find it. And then Drive Electric Columbus. We're on most of the major social medias as well.

[00:23:42] Myria: As well as having our own website at driveelectriccolumbus.com. There's pages on there about everything from the Inflation Reduction Act tax credits to all of our local events that we'll be out at and then photo galleries and we have some fun contests and everything else, so.

[00:23:58] Dominique: It's been amazing to hear how you went from being a first time EV owner and a first time solar navigator for your own house to being such an advocate and like a key player for everyone else. My last question is just like, what advice would you have for yourself like five, ten years ago?

[00:24:11] Myria: Don't be so afraid to take that first step. It seems like a doozy, but it's really not, and there are a lot of people out there ready to support you and be behind you, whichever part of it you're jumping into first. Don't let range anxiety for your EVs get the best of you. There's a whole world of charging out there so you can get to, I was in Cleveland yesterday and back, obviously, or I wouldn't be here, in Columbus today. You can get to a little bit of anywhere you'd want to go if you try to. And the same thing for the solar. You know that if you get a bad proposal or somebody gives you the heebie-jeebies whenever they're out to your house, look for somebody else. There's a variety of options. Don't let that stop you just because your first endeavor was maybe not quite what you thought it would be.

[00:24:55] Dominique: That's great.

[00:24:56] Adam: Awesome. Well, I look forward to next time diving in deeper into both of these. 

[00:24:59] Dominique: we'll talk next time about more about Solar United Neighbors, some the amazing funding you have right now and cool projects that you're working on, sharing information about.

[00:25:07] Adam: 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.

[00:25:18] Dominique: So if you know a Green Champion that should be our next guest, email us at thegreenchampions@gmail.com. You also can find our show notes at thegreenchampions.com. Our music is by Zayn Dweik. Thanks for listening to Green Champions. We're gonna dig further into Mryia's sustainability success story in our next episode. 

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