Here’s the latest installment of our new blog post series, Humans of Uprise! We love meeting and getting to know our customers, and now we’re sharing their stories with you. Meet Tracy Warren, who went solar with Uprise in December 2022.
Green Living In Northeast
Tracy’s roots are in the DMV — she grew up in Reston, but moved around as her father was in the CIA. When she moved back to the DMV, she knew she wanted to live in the city. But apartment life didn’t quite work for her garden aspirations.
“I was living in an apartment on Massachusetts Avenue in Capitol Hill, and had so many plants on the window ledge, it was like a tiny jungle,” Tracy says. “I only bought a house to have a garden.”
When I visited her home for our interview, we had a grand time exploring her backyard garden, which has an incredible story. After Tracy bought her Brookland rowhouse, she discovered her new backyard was filled with construction waste, including “rebar and huge bowling ball-sized chunks of concrete.”
“The man or family who had lived here before, they were having flooding issues and decided that the answer was to regrade the yard,” she says. “He actually invited people to come and dump their construction waste in the yard. They used it basically as a car lot and there was a concrete pad and diesel fuel. There were two yew trees out there and that was it. And I thought, nothing’s gonna grow here. Absolutely nothing’s gonna grow.”
But that wasn’t the end of the story for Tracy’s backyard. “I’ve been amending the soil slowly but surely,” she says. She also explored which plants grow best in Washington DC‘s climate. Today, you’d never be able to guess her backyard was once a dumping ground. Tracy pointed out toad lilies, mahonia, her experiments with Japanese tree pruning, a Crepe Myrtle, and a willow tree as we strolled through the garden. With proximity to the National Arboretum and Rock Creek Park, Brookland boasts incredible bird diversity. Birds eat the berries or nutlets from Tracy’s plants at different times throughout the year, and she’s spotted two peregrine falcons and a red-shouldered hawk in her backyard. Hummingbirds come for the native honeysuckle.
DC Highlight: Small Town In The City
Tracy moved to Brookland 20 years ago, and has watched the neighborhood change over the years. She says Brookland used to be an Irish working class neighborhood, and once had 72 convents and monasteries. When she moved in, some of the original Black families who moved to the area after desegregation in the 1940s still lived in the neighborhood.
“This area is really like a small town,” she says. “Very much like a small town in the city. Most people know everybody, especially if they have dogs. I mean, it’s very different than when I moved here. It’s been significantly gentrified. And I am seeing more and more solar panels on roofs.”
There are several nice places to walk, Tracy says, such as the Franciscan Monastery Garden, or the Howard University School of Divinity’s former location, which has a large lot behind it where locals can spot deer.
“And we did have a bear. We think it came from Hyattsville. Somebody put up a bear crossing sign, which is hilarious,” Tracy says. “I had a woodchuck show up in my back alley. I think of [woodchucks] as being very rural, but I know where it came from, because I saw them hanging out at the Howard University Divinity School. So we’ve got a lot of wildlife here in Brookland.”
Solar Made Possible With Uprise’s No-Cost Solar Program
If you’re worried the solar construction process impacted Tracy’s garden like I did, never fear. Luckily, most of her plants were dormant when the Uprise crew came to install the panels in December — and plus, in Tracy’s words, “Plants are far more resilient than we give them credit for.”
Uprise’s no-cost solar program made it possible for her to get the 20 panels now generating clean power on her rooftop.
“I couldn’t have done it otherwise,” Tracy says. “I had thought about doing solar but had been told about ten years ago the only economical option was solar water heating. Now the economics of solar are completely different.”
Beyond the process going smoothly for Tracy’s backyard plants, she also appreciated the communication from Uprise regarding any changes needing to happen along the way.
“The installation was totally fine. The guys were very friendly. Chris was really good about keeping me informed every step of the way. It was just extremely painless,” she says. “You always worry when doing something big like this. Solar is significant. I took a long time to think about it, and I did due diligence, asking other people. But the leasing option is low risk — solar reduces my electric bill. It was a good deal.”
Your Roof Can Be Part Of America’s Conversion To Clean Power
Tracy’s professional background is in renewable energy, specifically the energy transition.
“I worked on transmission. I was leading an effort to build support for interregional high-voltage transmission and a US macro grid. It’s still a project very close to my heart,” she says. “I’ve also been working for the Beneficial Electrification League, which is working on the consumer side of energy transmission with building support for transitioning to electric over propane, largely in rural areas.”
Now her roof is part of the energy transition too. And she’s seeing a difference. “My bills, especially during the summer, were extremely low. It was awesome,” she says. “I have three window units. I’m always concerned about how much it costs to run those and what that will do to my electric bill. Also, I switched my gas stove for an induction stove, which is a big upgrade. And my bills, regardless of all of that, are still very low.”
Do you live in Brookland, or in one of our other small towns in the city? Uprise can help you go solar too! Call us at (202) 280-2285 or fill out our form online to ask us about solar for your roof.
And check out our Humans of Uprise page to meet other neighbors going solar in DC too!