The History of SEIA

Since 1974, the Solar Energy Industry Association (SEIA) and its members have worked to promote, develop and implement the use of the sun as a virtually unlimited source of America's energy needs.

On January 24, 1974, a group of five industry members met in the noisy basement of at the Washington Hilton to discuss the possibility of establishing an association for the solar industry. They agreed to create "a broad-based trade association supporting prompt, orderly, widespread and open growth of solar energy resources now." This was the beginning of SEIA's more than three decades of solar energy advocacy.

SEIA faced a host of formidable challenges early on, chief among them, building a profitable solar energy industry. Sheldon Butt, SEIA's first president, was famously quoted as saying "shouldn't we have an industry before we can have an industry association?" But SEIA had emerged just as the effects of the first oil embargo were becoming painfully clear. SEIA would play a central role in integrating solar energy into the energy saving policies of the Carter Administration.

In the 1980s the solar industry faced one of its biggest challenges when President Regan signed a tax bill that severely cut federal research funding and residential tax credits. Despite the political climate, SEIA, through its strength in numbers, was able to promote ongoing research and development funding, which kept solar energy a priority for the Department of Energy.

SEIA has grown tremendously from its early days. By the 1990s, SEIA had built the association to encompass 150 national members. Today, SEIA represents nearly 900 solar companies in the photovoltaic (PV), solar water heating, concentrating solar power (CSP) and solar hybrid lighting industries and is a leader on a host of issues from the extension of federal tax credits for renewable energy to global climate change. The future of SEIA and the solar energy industry in America looks as bright as ever!