It can sometimes be challenging to find clean energy solutions that all stakeholders support. For example, California utility companies and their unions have fought against policies that support rooftop solar panels, successfully lobbying for a policy change that has caused rooftop solar adoption to plummet. In Washington State, the state’s cap and trade policy that generates millions of dollars for energy efficiency and clean energy is under attack on the ballot.

But to reduce carbon emissions and avert the worst impacts of global warming, we need to keep pursuing solutions. So, this summer it was refreshing to see a renewable energy technology that’s supported by clean energy advocates, gas utilities and their unions, as well as the local citizenry.

On a hot and humid summer morning, I visited the Framingham Public Schools Welcome Center to get a sneak-peek at the nation’s first utility-led community geothermal heating and cooling system.

I spoke with Zeyneb Magavi, the executive director of HEET, the nonprofit climate solutions incubator partnering with the city of Framingham and the gas utility Eversource to pilot America’s first neighborhood-scale networked geothermal project. She explained that networked geothermal is one of many technologies that can use the Earth’s temperature to reduce our reliance on fossil fuels. Magavi described a networked geothermal system where heat pumps in a number of different buildings are fed by fluid-filled pipes running under the street between homes and commercial buildings to wells bored hundreds of feet into the ground. The Earth’s constant underground temperature of 55°F at that depth serves as a heat source during winter and transfers indoor heat to the ground for cooling during the summer.

Magavi explained that networked geothermal systems offer a “layer cake” of efficiencies. By incorporating ground-source heat pumps, utility-scale infrastructure, and a design connecting all the wells and buildings in one continuous single pipe loop, these allow the different buildings in the network to serve as heat sources or heat sinks, in addition to the ground.

Having a variety of different buildings with different uses maximizes the efficiency of the network. For example, combining a school, a pharmacy, an office building and a series of residences into one network makes a more efficient system than if the buildings were all single-family homes. The Framingham geothermal network connects 37 buildings, including single-family homes, apartments managed by the Framingham Housing Authority, a fire station and school buildings.

One advantage of networked geothermal loops is that they are scalable. In the same way that individual solar panels can be connected to create larger solar arrays, individual loops can be connected to create a larger network. And in networked geothermal systems, the larger the network, the greater the efficiency.

In Framingham, one loop is nearing completion, and HEET and their partners are already planning a second. Loop 2 will interconnect with Loop 1 to include more residences, a CVS pharmacy and Army National Guard Recruiting Office. For Loop 2, the pump house, which circulates the fluid in the network, will be located underground to test geothermal networks’ success in densely settled urban environments with limited open space.

Data from the Framingham pilot will be monitored and analyzed by a research collaborative to help maximize the system’s environmental, consumer and public health benefits and develop scalable models and standards to drive broader adoption.

As we walked through the neighborhood where the network’s pipes had been laid underground, Magavi and I discussed the challenges to scaling up the technology. She said the biggest challenges are a shortage of trained geothermal drillers and drilling rigs, and that much of the housing stock has problems unrelated to the geothermal network that drive up costs.

To overcome these challenges, Magavi said state leaders must clearly signal their support for geothermal energy to give utility companies, technical colleges and others the confidence to invest in training geothermal drillers and the equipment that will allow networks to scale rapidly in the coming years.

Massachusetts is taking some steps in that direction. Thirteen Massachusetts communities, including Deerfield, recently received funding to pilot local geothermal networks.

As I reflect on the tour, I can’t help but think of Ralph Nader’s timeless quote, “This country has more problems than it should tolerate and more solutions than it uses.”

Networked geothermal, by using existing technologies in novel ways, offers an efficient, cost-effective way to transition neighborhoods off polluting methane gas and repower our lives with renewable energy.

Johanna Neumann of Amherst has spent the past two decades working to protect our air, water and open spaces, defend consumers in the marketplace and advance a more sustainable economy and democratic society.