Chaberton Energy: Developing sustainable infrastructures with a focus on community solar projects and distributed energy generation

In any publication, the headlines about climate change and the clean energy transition abound. Sustainable and renewable energy projects are the future, and companies like Chaberton Energy are doing it right by focusing on distributed energy generation and community solar while considering its larger impact on the environment and local communities.

Chaberton Energy’s story: A sweeping impact

Chaberton Energy’s journey began on February 27, 2020, when Founder and CEO Stefano Ratti met with the company’s first landowner prospect. This was the first time Stefano pitched Chaberton as an independent developer of solar projects. From this first meeting, Stefano not only created a successful solar company, but also built it on values that benefit the environment while making a social impact. Today, Chaberton is a public benefit corporation, which means their work generates social and public good while operating responsibly and sustainably.

Chaberton began with a vision to take a leading role in the energy transition and help create a future powered by clean energy; four years into its journey, the company’s vision is becoming a reality. Since its inception, Chaberton has grown to a team of 50; with a quickly expanding team, Chaberton has achieved new heights with over 100 projects under site control, and a total pipeline of nearly 1.5 gigawatts of solar capacity, enough energy to power over 150,000 homes. Chaberton is now developing projects in Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey, Illinois and New Mexico, among others. What these states have in common is good policy, and support for deploying community solar.

Understanding community solar

Unlike the solar panels commonly found atop residential roofs or the expansive arrays used by utility companies, community solar farms fall in between in terms of size. These projects enable local community members to subscribe to the electricity generated by the array. In return for their subscription, participants receive credits on their electricity bills, which translates to savings while supporting the adoption of clean energy.

Over four years, the company has achieved inflection points of growth through intentional thinking around several themes, including operationalizing its foundational values and proactively engaging employees in a remote-based environment. Because of this intentionality, employees feel a sense of purpose, and they have a sense of belonging within the larger team while focusing on their particular functional area. The team remains nimble and develops projects as efficiently as possible.

Chaberton’s journey thus far has been a highly exceptional and rewarding one. In line with their values of creativity, excellence, and humanity, encapsulating how they approach their work, the Chaberton team sets out to not just do any projects, but excellent projects, and not just hire any employees, but exceptional employees. These conscious choices have allowed them to take calculated risks that have ultimately led them to benefit customers, communities, and partners.

A culture of difference-making

Chaberton Energy is lucky to have a team of talented, passionate, and driven individuals who have a keen interest in the company and are committed to doing what’s best for the business, its partners, the community, and the environment. Chaberton has found that when employees have a stake in the company, they jump in with two feet, embodying the company’s values and bringing their best work to the table each day. In fact, all employees with a year of service to the company have some level of company ownership through equity shares. This focus on the team has led to best-in-class solar development and highly efficient processes at the company. The fact that Chaberton is a public benefit corporation means the company and its employees really are in this to create a better, more sustainable world.

Chaberton creates a better, more sustainable world through their solar projects that benefit communities by providing them with more affordable energy, higher local tax revenue, and cleaner, carbon-free electricity. However, staying true to their values, this is not where they stop; through Chaberton Cares, they level up the benefits to the communities they serve by providing direct funding to local non-profit organizations. For every megawatt of new community solar capacity they develop, Chaberton Cares provides $5,000 in funding for local organizations.

Chaberton Energy believes in being good partners from start to finish; they work closely with their project landowners to identify causes and community organizations that are important to them. They make sure support provided through Chaberton Cares helps create the equitable and sustainable social impacts that are the hallmark of their work.

Services that go beyond

While Chaberton Energy focuses primarily on developing renewable energy projects, they also take care of every detail leading up to the construction of their projects. That includes all the legwork to get a project fully permitted while Chaberton’s teams work diligently to solicit buy-in from community members.

When developing a project, Chaberton looks at the full value chain of possibilities. That can include battery storage and optimization measures that make the most sense for communities and businesses of all kinds. Finally, Chaberton’s stage gate process ensures a high degree of discipline, leading to a high project success rate, efficiency in spending, and optimum returns.

Many of Chaberton’s projects aim to preserve the quality of the land for future generations. Some of Chaberton’s projects are designed with a dual-use in mind, for example, to utilize farm animals such as sheep to graze the land around solar arrays. Many of Chaberton’s projects also include native plant species and pollinators, which strongly support native birds and plant species and can be beneficial for nearby farmers through improved pollination services, potentially increasing crop yields and quality. And after the solar projects’ 30- to 40-year lifecycle, the land is delivered back to the landowner in its original condition or better. Chaberton has decommissioning agreements in place after the lease term ends to secure plans for state-of-the-art reuse, recycling, or disposal practices for their equipment.

Chaberton is on the cutting edge of market and policy analysis, and it is extremely nimble in seeking new markets where it can provide services and compete for business. Knowing the markets allows Chaberton to innovate in project design and development. It has several truly innovative projects in the planning stages that could combine community solar and commercial solar based on the respective benefits they provide to the client. These flexible and innovative projects are areas of great promise for the future.

About | Stefano Ratti

Stefano Ratti is the CEO of Chaberton Energy and a visionary entrepreneur. He started a highly successful renewable energy development company and insisted on doing it based on a set of values that ensure the quality of those projects, their social impacts, their contribution to the clean energy transition, the company’s ability to innovate, and employees’ satisfaction. Stefano’s insistence that Chaberton be a public benefit corporation speaks to his commitment to running a company focused on sustainability and the public good.

With 20 years of experience in the energy industry, Stefano has developed more than $1 billion in renewable fuel and solar energy assets. He previously led greenfield development teams and held management positions at Enviva, Areva, and Boston Consulting Group. He holds a B.S. and M.S. in Energy Engineering from Politecnico di Milano.