There may soon be solar panels on some Erie County buildings.
The solar additions would arrive as lawmakers move to change the County Charter to allow longer leases on the panels to potentially save money and system electricity.
The county is already on an extensive program to install energy-efficient lights, especially in the Rath Building.
"We're looking at ways to incorporate them more," said Legislature Majority Leader Joseph Lorigo.
"We're changing light bulbs to LEDs from the garage all the way up to the 16th floor of the Rath Building. We're looking at places that we can put solar panels to defray some electricity costs. I'm in favor of doing those proposals."
Lorigo says he isn't sure if there are any county solar panels now but there are facilities where it might be easier to generate electricity with panels than running power lines in.
Possibly, the new panels might even come from the SolarCity manufacturing plant in South Buffalo which is supposed to start building the panels later this year.
