Author Archives: Frank Andorka

Nevada Comes All The Way Back, Bumps Into Net Metering Caps For First Tier

By Frank Andorka, Senior Correspondent

What’s happening in Nevada right now is frankly amazing.

If you had told most observers that Nevada would ever hit net metering caps after its Public Utilities Commission ended the program without warning at the end of 2015, they would have told you that you were crazy.

And yet, three years (and a lot of mea culpas later), here we are, with the state’s installed and applied-for solar capacity hitting the cap for what’s allowed by law at full retail net metering rates.

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What that means is that any rooftop solar installation will at this point be compensated at 88% of the retail rate in what is being referred to as Tier 2. There are currently four tiers in Nevada’s net metering program.

Nevada’s solar industry has been ping-ponging between support and opposition for the solar industry since December 2015, when the state’s Public Utilities Commission abruptly ended net metering, which compensates solar users for the excess electricity they export back to the grid. It caused several national solar installers to pull out of the state and set off a firestorm of criticism from the state’s rooftop solar industry, which cratered in response.

Obviously, the ping-ponging has come to a stop, as rooftop solar has clearly taken off under the latest round of legislation. Solar Industry has the details on what’s next:

Under A.B.405, NEM customers in the Tier II category will receive an excess energy credit of 88% of the retail rate for the net excess electricity sent back to the grid and beyond what was delivered to them by Nevada utility NV Energy over the monthly billing period (as opposed to 95% in Tier I). Customers in the Tier II category may have the opportunity to move into Tier I through attrition and until Tier I closes. Tiers III and IV have rates of 81% and 75%, respectively.

All this activity comes as a ballot initiative moves forward in the state to raise the state’s renewable portfolio standard to 50% by 2030. If the latest numbers from the PUC are any indication, Nevada and its solar industry are healthy and growing – something that should excite solar advocates everywhere.

More:

Nevada Hits Milestone For Newly Revived Rooftop Solar Market

You Know Who’s Still Betting Heavily On Solar? Corporations, That’s Who!

By Frank Andorka, Senior Correspondent

Corporate renewable energy procurement has hit a new record high in 2018, according to the Business Renewables Center, an arm of the Rocky Mountain Institute.

Procurement levels reached 3.57 GW, beating the previous record of 3.12 GW in 2015 and increasing nearly three quarters of a gigawatt ahead of last year’s number of 2.87 GW.

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Jon Creyts, managing director at Rocky Mountain Institute, said:

The Business Renewables Center applauds the acceleration of corporate renewable energy procurement and the dedication these companies are showing to turn commitment into action. We are bearing witness to unprecedented growth in this market, which is critical to achieving the goal of a clean, prosperous, and secure low-carbon economy.

Unsurprisingly, Facebook led the way, putting corporate procurement into record territory with the deal it announced last month to procure 437 megawatts (MW) of solar energy from Pacific Power for a data center in Oregon.

The announcement also claimed:

[This] highlights the growth of corporate-backed renewable energy transactions, which have totaled 13.52 GW in the U.S. since 2008, according to data collected by RMI’s Business Renewables Center. To date, BRC member companies have been involved in 99% of all U.S.-based non-utility transactions for renewable energy, and the number of corporates contracting directly for clean energy has grown from just four companies in 2013 to nearly 60 companies today.

The year-over-year growth is not unexpected, particularly given the difficult circumstances the solar industry found itself in last year with the tariff discussions. Corporations were waiting to see how the tariff situation would play out before deciding to move forward with solar procurement. What is most interesting, however, is that not only have the circumstances not changed significantly – the 30% tariffs are still in place – but the situation has gotten worse (with new 25% tariffs being imposed on inverters and modules).

And yet corporations are still investing in solar as their future – which is an indication that the Solar Revolution has moved beyond its strictly policy-driven past and into a future driven by pure economics. And that is something we can all agree is best for the solar industry in the long run.

Utility Tries To Scuttle Knoxville, Iowa, Solar Plan At The Last Second, FAILS

By Frank Andorka, Senior Correspondent

Knoxville, Iowa, has been working on developing a solar plan for the city that would save it nearly $400,000 over the lifespan of a 30-year power-purchase agreement (PPA). But when it came to the final vote, MidAmerican Energy – the city’s utility – came in and tried to lobby against it.

The last-ditch attempt to keep solar from the citizens of Knoxville failed on a 3-1 vote, according to reports in the Knoxville Journal-Express.

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Megan Suhr, a Knoxville council member, told the paper:

Renewable energy is something I care deeply about, so I know how some of these things work. [The utility] didn’t present us with any data that said this wasn’t a good choice for the city. This shows people in our community that we are progressive. We’re excited about renewable energy. We’re taking a leadership role in providing some solar capacity for our city facilities.

Even with Knoxville council’s blessing, the deal with Red Lion Renewables isn’t a 100% done deal. As the newspaper reports, the developer:

…needs to raise $150,000 for the most visible array, to be built as a parking shelter on a city lot just north of the firehouse at 308 S. 3rd St. It would power City Hall, Knoxville Fire & Rescue and the Knoxville Public Library, but nothing will happen if the money doesn’t emerge soon….

If MidAmerican read SolarWakeup, they would know they’re going to struggle to convince Iowans that renewable energy is not the way to go (although part of their argument was that they weren’t against renewables; they were just against non-MidAmerican owned renewables). As we’ve been reporting recently, one of MidAmerican’s competitors, Alliant Energy, has already agreed to pay to shut down a nuclear plant and eliminate coal from its portfolio by 2050.

Plus, the last-minute nature of their appeal is suspicious. Council meetings are public record, and you can be sure this issue didn’t just crop up on the most recent council agenda. So why were they rushing in at the last minute to attempt to scuttle the deal? Only MidAmerican can answer that question – but Knoxville’s city council didn’t bite at their argument – and if the money comes through, it looks like Knoxville, Iowa, will become the next city to add solar to its electricity-generation portfolio outside of the utility’s grasp.

More:

City solar plan survives power struggle with utility>

Maryland Launches Six-Project Community Solar Pilot Program

By Frank Andorka, Senior Correspondent

Maryland today launched a six-project community solar program that is looking for subscribers, according to an article in today’s Baltimore Sun.

Community solar programs are now all the rage, as solar continues to spread and solar companies are realizing that it can go beyond individual homeowners and businesses putting solar arrays on their roof. It’s the perfect hybrid of utility-scale solar providing electricity for residential and consumer customers.

The program has been in place since 2015, when the Maryland legislature authorized it. But writer Scott Dance asserts that it hasn’t taken off because of NIMBY-ism combined with arguments over where the appropriate placement for the arrays are.

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As Dru Schmidt-Perkins, the former president of the land conservation group 1,000 Friends of Maryland, told the Sun:

People are very much in favor of going for a lot more renewables, for whatever reason. That support comes to a screeching halt when land that is perceived to be valuable for other things, whether a historic viewshed or farming, suddenly becomes a target of a location for this new project.

Now, the conflict between farming and solar is a real concern in Maryland although, as we wrote about yesterday, perhaps it should be less of a concern than it is. But such concerns have halted development in many Maryland counties, as the Sun reports:

Such concerns have at least temporarily stalled the momentum for solar across the state. Anne Arundel County had at least five small community solar projects in the pipeline in December when officials decided to pause development for eight months. Baltimore County officials imposed a four-month moratorium on solar development before passing an ordinance last year to limit the size and number of solar farms.

It remains to be seen if such concerns outweigh the hunger for community solar in a state that has been among the leading states in the Mid-Atlantic region for solar development. The six new projects the government has launched should give everyone a better picture of how much work still needs to be done in those rural areas to bring these farms to fruition.

(To hear an excellent recap of how similar concerns are being overcome in Illinois, listen to the latest edition of the SolarWakeup podcast, where Jon Carson of Trajectory Energy Partners outlines his strategy for bringing more community solar to rural areas.)

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Maryland launches community solar program, creating new green energy opportunities — but also potential conflicts