American Renewable Energy
4041 North High Street, Columbus, Ohio, United States

We bring financial stability, energy resilience, business development, and solid community engagement to our clients. We serve cities, towns, villages, and school districts. We do this through the design, development, and operation of high-quality distributed energy projects. 

American Renewable  From start to Present

• In 2002, we at ARE decided that distributed clean power was the only building project worth doing.

• Beginning in 2003 we began solving technical, financial and environmental problems by designing and building two multi-million dollar green homes. LEED certification for residential projects was not available then, but our projects would have easily qualified.

• In 2004, we joined the ranks of LEED APs. From 2004 to 2006, ARE designed and installed approximately 25 Geothermal projects, and 20 commercial solar projects in the Chicago area.

• In 2006, ARE won several awards from the Association of Energy Engineers, including "Innovator or the of Year" for community microgrid design.

• In 2007, ARE built its first Micro Grid, a residential project consisting of geothermal, solar, and energy storage and management systems.

• In 2008 we became licensed electrical contractors and NABCEP certified PV and Solar Thermal installation professionals.

• In 2009-10 we worked with the Hispanic Housing Development Corporation of Chicago to design and develop a private energy company to serve the affordable housing national community.

• In 2011, ARE began building large-scale solar projects for school districts, career centers, and public power in the state of Ohio, by completing​ the first 1 Mw+ solar generator for an Ohio School District.​ In 2012, we became licensed Electrical Contractors in Ohio.

• In 2015, ARE completed its 17th project in Ohio, the first in the nation to include both utility-scale solar power and utility-scale storage capacity.

• In 2016, ARE introduced the first municipal micro grid and the first utility-scale community solar project in the Mid-Atlantic region.

What is energy storage?

Energy Storage is a device that allows energy created by solar power or other sources to be captured and stored for later use. The most common kind of energy storage is the use of a battery.  Adding energy storage to any type of energy generation adds many benefits including improving the way energy is delivered, consumed, and generated.  Combining your solar array project with an energy storing battery can greatly increase your economic performance.

There are many reasons why we recommend energy storage paired  with your solar power system some of the benefits of energy storage include

• reduction of peak load
• emergency back up power during a power outage
• blackstart service to energize substation after prolonged outage
• energy independence
• faster response in increased energy needs than traditional natural gas methods
• helps speed up the return on investment making the entire project more financially sound

What is Community solar?

• Ownership of a typical solar project has most often been by a single entity. This entity might be a major utility, the owner of a business, an investment group, or a homeowner. Community Solar changes all that. Inside a Community Solar Project (CSP), there can be multiple owners; an unrestricted combination of local government, businesses, and homeowners. These owners are typically referred to as subscribers and are able to purchase a part of the power that is produced from the community solar array. The power the subscriber purchases from that array will then appear as a credit on their bill saving  money each month.  
• Financing:​ The primary purpose of the CSP is to make solar ownership available to anyone who has an electric bill. There are more options available than this space would allow, but the good news is that this flexibility can foster a win all around for the stakeholders and the community as a whole. 
• Metering is provided in such a way that each individual knows the monthly output of his or her portion of the solar production. The CSP owners then receive credit for this output through an online production report,  an investment report, and in many cases, as a credit toward their own monthly electric bill.