Steyer-Taylor Center Director Dan Reicher comments on how companies are expanding benefits to include easier access to clean energy for The New York Times.  

Expanding the notion of corporate benefits beyond discounted health club memberships and low insurance rates, a group of major companies is set to offer employees access to cheaper solar systems for the home.

Under an arrangement announced Wednesday, employees of the companies — Cisco Systems, 3M, Kimberly-Clark and National Geographic — will be able to buy or lease solar systems for their homes at rates substantially lower than the national average, executives said. The program, offered through Geostellar, an online marketer of solar systems, will be available to more than 100,000 employees and will include options for their friends and families in the United States and parts of Canada.

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Increasingly, said Dan Reicher, executive director of the Steyer-Taylor Center for Energy Policy and Finance at Stanford University, groups are working with businesses to influence not only energy policy but also the markets, which dovetails with a growing corporate focus on clean technologies.

“In the old days there wasn’t a big alliance to build around solar energy because it was such an infinitesimal part of the energy picture and prices were so high,” Mr. Reicher said. “Now that it’s becoming a more mainstream, cost-competitive approach, it makes sense for environmental organizations to build alliances with the business community to get this technology to market.”

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