What is missing form the dialogue about solar and alternative development of energy and the transmission thereof is the ownership structure of advanced renewable energy system development. As is often the case the U.S. Department of Energy is involved in providing loans or loan guarantees, as well as research grants. Should any development of renewable energy systems involve taxpayer monies, the government should require that the utility users/customers share in the private, individual ownership of the development, turning every customer into an owner of the power utility. This can be accomplished by forming a for-profit, professionally managed, citizen-owned “Community Investment Corporation” (CIC) or Citizens Land Bank (CLB) (www.http://cesj.org/homestead/strategies/community/cic-full-nk.html).
While the CLB would create new private sector jobs and entrepreneurial opportunities, its main accent is on widespread participation, particularly in the ownership of land, technology, buildings and infrastructure that must be fabricated upon the community’s land for expanding the local economy. The Citizens Land Bank is designed to serve as a for-profit land planner and private sector developer geared to rational innovation and change at the community level.
Using the most advanced tools of the free enterprise system––especially innovative credit and financing tools-the CLB would create new owners of newly created assets, without taking existing property away from present owners.
The CLB strategy and its institutional structure for mobilizing citizen action are easily adaptable to areas of virtually any size, such as land surrounding nodes of a mass transit system, a downtown renewal area, or an inner-city neighborhood. The CLB can even be adopted for an entire city, metropolitan area or natural region of the country.
The CLB would create new opportunities for corporate executives, real estate professionals and the best advisors that money can buy, but they would be accountable to the CLB’s lenders and shareholders through the CLB’s broadly representative board of directors. Local enterprises could then compete more dynamically in the global marketplace without special protections or subsidies.
