June 15, River Fuchs and Rhodes Thompson, Solar Energy Solutions: Shining a Light on Solar: Unveiling the Power, Policies, and Incentives Behind Renewable Energy

LEXINGTON, KY – The Rotary Club of Lexington  held its weekly meeting Thursday, June 15, at The Mane on Main, Chase Bank building on Main St. The program’s guest speakers  were River Fuchs and Rhodes Thompson, Solar Energy Solutions.

This meeting was also be on Zoom. For the Zoom link please email, trafton@rotarylexky.org.

If you would like to have lunch, please contact Jenny@rotarylexky.org  to reserve your meal.

“Here comes the sun (Doo-d-doo-doo); here comes the sun.  And I say, “It’s alright.” – George Harrison/The Beatles

For today’s speakers, River Fuchs and Rhodes Thompson, the sun is certainly “alright”, as will become apparent from their presentation to us entitled “Shining a Light on Solar:  Unveiling the Power, Policies, and Incentives Behind Renewable Energy”.  Their knowledge of this highly relevant topic comes from their involvement with Solar Energy Solutions (SES).

SES was founded in Lexington seventeen years ago and is the region’s foremost solar engineering, procurement, and construction firm. SES is the sole vetted installer for Solarize Lexington, a bulk-purchasing solar discount program run by the Lexington-Fayette Urban County Government (LFUCG).  SES’s headquarters and primary warehouse is here in Lexington; a second warehouse is in Louisville.  Other warehouses/sales locations are in Indianapolis, Indiana and Cincinnati, Ohio.

River is the Regional Sales Director for SES. A 2021 graduate of Centre College, he began working in renewables that year as an intern in SES’s Design and Engineering department. River currently manages the company’s residential and light commercial sales team in Kentucky. He owes gratitude to the Rotary Club of Shelbyville for a scholarship and the opportunity to make it to the speech contest regionals in 2017.

Rhodes is the commercial project manager for SES.  He began his career in the renewable energy industry in 2006.  After working in several other states, he came back home to Kentucky and started working for SES in 2015.  He holds a master electrician license in Kentucky and has previously been licensed in Colorado and Tennessee.  Rhodes graduated from Centre College in 2004 with a degree in Philosophy, and benefited from a scholarship from the Paris, KY Rotary Club during his four years in Danville.

Solarize Lexington is a project announced by the LFUCG earlier this year.  At that time the program was lauded as initiative to bring more solar power to Lexington and Fayette County.  The public’s initial response to the program has, according to news reports, “far exceeded their expectations.”  Through Solarize Lexington, households will be able to access discounted wholesale rates on solar installations of up to twenty percent.  That is in addition to federal tax credits of about thirty percent. SES was selected by the LFUCG as it approved installer through a bid process.

Welcome to Rotary, River and Rhodes.