Doesn’t sound like winner winner chicken dinner for housing affordability – rooftop solar doesn’t make sense for all installs and the last thing California needs is more cumbersome, one-size-fits-all riders added to its building codes. Solar already makes financial sense for many people even with the dumb changes to CA net metering. You don’t need to require people to do things that make financial sense – you just need to make sure there aren’t odious barriers in the way.

What they should be doing – and certainly are – is funding green banks and the like to create low/no cost financing for people who want to install residential renewables. Or for neighborhoods/communities that want to go in together on solar gardens et al… Dollar for dollar way more effective, and carrots always work better than sticks in the body of US politics plus (and are harder for conservatives to snatch away down the line thanks to delicious loss aversion).

If they’re modifying building codes, it should be to reduce/eliminate the scope of expensive, leaky, anti-consumer natural gas and increasing home efficiency standards overall. And more important, eliminating cumbersome restrictive zoning/parking requirements and encouraging locally-driven infill development at the smallest scales. Also be strict as hell with urban green bands which are proven effective at improving urban density/fighting sprawl over time. Sprawl is the worst thing a city can do both environmentally and for its financial sustainability and don’t let the YIMBY types tell you otherwise.