Agenda - Council Work Session - 04/11/2023

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What are the financing sources the community has identified? 1. Because the site is technically owned by the MN Pollution Control Agency, there is the possibility of raising Revenue Bonds to pay for the Brightfield. 2. There is also the possibility for the electric utility, Connexus Energy Cooperative, to source their own funding to pay for the development of the site, especially considering they just did so at another location in the city last year. 3. More traditional third -party investment and ownership is also a possibility, depending on how the legal landscape around the GO Bonds used to finance the closure of the site, as well as the safe harbor laws around GO Bonding in MN, are interpreted. 4. The Rural Renewable Energy Alliance also has their emerging business model, "Community Solar for Community Action" (CS4CA), as another potential finance and ownership model. This model is more flexible in its financing as projects in this program have used Community Action Agencies, Grants, and/or traditional accredited investors as financing sources. 5. The Pay -For -Success model and it's finance mechanism is another possibility as one of the main desired outcomes of this project is addressing systemically energy -burdened homes by slating Brightfield Development in MN to be tied to paying for a reduced electricity tariff rate for LMI households qualifying for LIHEAP, EAP, and/or WAP. 6. Financing sources would also be driven by the ability to execute Virtual Power Purchase Agreements (VPPA's), Virtual Net -Metering Agreements, and/or 7. Lastly, the aggregation of grants from universities and research organizations should we actually be able to develop the site as a sort of "living lab" for environmentally -sound practices as ground -mounted solar sites, as well as closed landfill sites (pollinators, surface and ground water quality, increased vegetation density, vegetative carbon sequestration, etc.)