Penn State Center for Energy Law & Policy Now Has Available An Online Database Of Local Solar Ordinances From 300 Local Governments In 57 Counties

The Penn State Center for Energy Law and Policy has just published a user-friendly Pennsylvania Solar Ordinance Database with 4,900 ordinance provisions from 300 local governments across 57 counties. 

The database includes filters for a variety of provisions in local government ordinances addressing grid-scale solar development.

The Center is continuing to improve and expand the database, and we welcome comments, suggestions, or corrections sent to hwiseman@psu.edu. 

This database can be used in conjunction with the recently updated Municipal Officials’ Guide to Grid-Scale Solar Development in Pennsylvania, which was developed to assist Pennsylvania municipal officials with questions about the various aspects of grid-scale solar development and to provide sources for those pursuing additional information about solar development in Pennsylvania.

Database research and compilation efforts were led by Professor Mohamed Rali Badissy, Affiliate Faculty, Penn State Dickinson Law; Michael Helbing, Executive Director, Center for Energy Law and Policy; and Professor Hannah Wiseman, Penn State Dickinson Law and College of Earth and Mineral Sciences and co-director, Center for Energy Law and Policy. 

Finn Burns and Sakshi Jain were instrumental in populating, organizing, and constructing the database. 

Candace Boyle, Bienvenido Concepcion, Jhonathan Jesus Mariano Ordinola Diaz, Jiahang Ding, Owen Dombert, Alejandra Edwards, Binderiya Enkhamgalan, Amerika Jayme, Ariel Gootkin, Ons Jerbi, Swaraj Lakshmi Krishnakumar, Yongzheng Li, Mariem Ouslati, Patrick Quinnan, Leonard Sandler, and Benjamin Wyrosdick provided excellent research work locating ordinances and entering data.

Funding acknowledgments: The Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection, the Center for Energy Law and Policy, and the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation through a grant entitled “Just Energy Transitions and Place” financially supported this work.

This material is based upon work supported by the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Critical Minerals and Energy Innovation through the Reliable Energy Siting through Technical Engagement and Planning (R-STEP) program. 

R-STEP is administered with support from the Partnership Intermediary Agreement that the U.S. Department of Energy established with ENERGYWERX.

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[Posted: August 29, 2026 ]  PA Environment Digest