It was earnings week in solar and I want to give you some below the fold headlines about what I heard. Sunrun is up tomorrow and should reveal some more story lines about residential. SolarCity posted over 200MW of deployed and installed for the 2nd quarter which I still find impressive, even if Wall Street isn’t too excited. Elon Musk on the call revealed their new idea however, the solar roof. Integrated PV into roofing material, much like the Dow solar shingle which also existed under Uni-Solar brand a decade ago. I am uniquely interested to see if SolarCity is also going to be a roofing company which should be an interesting talking point at the NRCA headquarters. SolarCity didn’t comment whether they would be the roofer or work with the roofing community. In other news, Sunpower is shedding some 1,200 jobs, a 1,000 of which are in the Philippines. One reason is to focus more on residential, which makes plenty of sense given that the high efficiency product yields about 50% of their revenues and has over 20% margins compared to the negative margin in the power plant segment (see the presentation here). More to come on the resi market next week when we get all of the story lines from the big 3.
- Bloomberg: SunPower ‘Guidance Bomb’ Leaves Crater Among Solar Companies
- PV-Magazine: AEE – Changes in state policies could unlock corporate renewable energy use
- Renewable Energy World: Kenya to Install 23 Solar Mini-Grids to Power Remote North
- Think Progress: A Murdoch-Owned TV Channel Will Air A Landmark Climate Series Before The Election
- PV-Tech: SolarCity’s 1GW Buffalo fab to produce complete BIPV residential roofing system
- EDF: How Clean Energy’s Rising Tide Can Lift All Boats
- GreenBiz: California cap-and-trade – A booming success in disguise
- Boston Globe: Mitsubishi looks to make Boston its base for solar expansion
Opinion
Have a great day!
Yann