Solar energy’s day is dawning

State to embark on its biggest-ever photovoltaic project

When the sun rises on New Year’s Day, it will signal the start of California’s most ambitious effort yet to generate electricity from sunlight.

The California Solar Initiative commits the state to spending more than $3.4 billion over the next 10 years to subsidize the installation of 1 million solar roofs, or about 3,000 megawatts of electricity capacity, enough at peak output to match six modern natural-gas-fired power plants.

Even more important, the initiative is aimed at driving down the cost of solar-generated power to the point that it’s comparable to producing power from burning coal and natural gas.

As things stand, electricity from photovoltaic systems