New York City's solar power push

New York has a long way to go before becoming that solar utopia. The city currently only gets a tiny fraction of its power from solar. And until there's a good way to store the electricity generated during the day and release it at night, solar will likely continue to make up a modest part of the city's overall energy mix.

But even a small amount of solar can help the city in big ways. It can reduce the overall stress on the electric grid, eliminating the need to build expensive new transformers or lay underground transmission wire.

During hot days when air conditioning is working overtime, it can reduce the chance of a blackout and cut the need to fire up older, dirtier generators.

"Some people are waiting to see what the federal or state government will do," David Bragdon, head of Mayor Michael Bloomberg's sustainability office, said at a recent solar conference in the city. "But important things are happening right here."

Among them: A new hyper-accurate map of the city that is designed to gauge solar's potential building-by-building. A plan to put solar farms on top of old landfills. New financial incentives that add to existing city, state and federal subsidies. And an overall streamlining of the solar power permitting bureaucracy.

These measures, combined with a mandate that requires 30% of the state's power to come from renewable sources by 2015, are driving the development of solar.