Solar Market Survey. The August survey is now available and I hope you participate in responding. This is an important Q3 checkin and outlines the Q4 opportunities ahead.
Roth Capital Market Update. Next Tuesday at 10am Easter, join me and others on the Roth Capital solar market update. You can register (free) here.
Farewell Exxon. A few years ago Exxon was the most valuable company by market cap in the world and the CEO was en route to being the Secretary of State. Now Exxon has lost over half of its market cap and removed from the Dow Jones Industrial Average where it has been for 92 years. That leaves Chevron as the sole remaining oil company in the average. I’m not on a strategic committee at the oil companies but the fact that none of them have bought a utility or entered electric generation or EV infrastructure in a meaningful way is dumbfounding.
PURPA Fights In Big Sky. Solar developers have won a ruling at the Montana Supreme Court regarding their complaint that regulators didn’t follow PURPA rules when they cut the contract value and terms for qualifying facilities. I like it when solar fights go to unusual places and win.
All Eyes On Senate. The Senate released a report titled “The Case For Climate Action: Building a Clean Economy for the American People.” Obvious problem with the report is that it only comes from the Democrats in the Senate not the full body, an unfortunate sign of the times. Senator Schatz (Hawaii-D) sat down with Vox’s David Roberts to go through the report. One note to watch post November, will Senator Manchin keep his chairmanship of the Energy committee or will he be upgraded to something else. The democrats will maneuver this sensitive area because they can’t go Joshua Lyman on Senator Manchin and risk a party switch. On the other hand, Manchin is the most conservative member of the caucus and could hold up critical work on climate change if the democrats have the majority.
A Southeastern RTO. An interesting idea but with the most powerful monopolies in the Country operating in the Southeast, consider this a pipe dream (for now).
Puerto Rico’s Opportunity. Puerto Rico is adopting a renewables based plan instead of gas generation, which makes sense given the complexities in keeping the transmission stable on the island during hurricanes. I know many on the mainland are keen to work with Puerto Rico and executing on the strategy.
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The Need And Value Of DG To Utility Scale. Yesterday the California legislature passed SB 364, a bill that only matters if a proposition is passed by voters in November. Assuming the Governor signs the bill, which he is expected to, the bill ensures that C&I and utility scale solar are not crushed by new property taxes. This is where the value of a strong state chapter like CALSSA came in. This is why utility scale solar and distributed generation are aligned in advocacy and market development. Without the help of DG and state advocates this bill would have failed passage. It took the collective push of all to ensure success. Sometimes not all things have to directly benefit you to benefit you in the long run, if homeowners can’t put solar on their homes and business do you think they will help advance policies that allow large scale solar to be built? Will politicians help an industry that leaves their constituents behind? I hope this is an event that brings solar closer together and maybe as a sign of goodwill, brings utility scale companies into the CALSSA membership. It’s a big tent and you just saw what it’s worth to you.
The Politics Of CA Blackouts. Trump is politicizing the blackouts in California, taking the talking point of a green dream causing terrible grid harm. Grid operators have said that a 500mw plant going offline unexpectedly was the final trigger on the issues. It was the help of consumers and a call for aid from consumers to reduce consumption that kept the issues from cascading from there. The details won’t stop the White House from trying to tie renewables to instability, even regulators that know better are jumping on this and ex-Enron folks are eager to rewrite history from circa 2000.
Old Generations Versus New Price Signals. The major shift regulators need to take up immediately is a new price signal for demand reduction, to shape consumer demand in times of need. Shaping demand based on consumer behavior is a major market challenge but startups like OhmConnect have shown that given the right price signal, consumers will adapt. Pricing that allows opportunities for DG storage to operate in a distribute environment could give California over 5GW of flex capacity without the need to contract for it upfront just by providing an opportunity to generate value. This is a forward looking method as opposed to keeping existing plants ready for closure open.
Twitter Talks DOE. Less than a 100 days until the election and energy twitter is equal parts working hard to elect Biden while also giddy at the thought of filing the cabinets, especially DOE. While DOE does great work on R&D and advancing solar soft cost reductions, DOE is primarily the department of nuclear energy including being responsible for the nuclear stockpile. The EPA is where pollution, clean air and water reside but it is less powerful as an administration not department. For what it’s worth, my pick for DOE Secretary is Governor Granholm, an early adopter of solar policies and solar manufacturing in Michigan.
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Looking At The TVA. Every time someone in energy makes the argument that a utility should be made public as a muni or a coop I immediately think of the TVA. A public entity with a board appointed by Congress, with the highest paying position in the federal government, TVA is one of the most anti-solar utilities in the Country. This is supported by the antics of SMUD, LADWP and many others across the Country as well. The clean energy industry needs to examine the regulatory appointment process in every State and if Biden wins, look at the boards within the federal government as well. I want to be on the board of the TVA, not to be the inside solar guy but to make TVA the best run utility in the Country and be pro-solar and clean. We need our industry pros to be PSC commissioners, PSC staffers and secretaries at the state level also, the talent is here but we have to fight for it.
Worth Repeating. On Friday’s newsletter we highlighted the comments from Joe Biden in his DNC speech. It’s worth repeating on this Monday morning that climate change and the promise of clean energy jobs was prioritized to the top of the issues calendar. What solar policies do you think a Biden admin should prioritize?
Hope For The Best. This is the best way to describe the situation in California, and that’s before we talk about the wildfires. California is the first state on the mainland to push for a major energy transition and is stuck somewhere in no-man’s land. Parts of the market look deregulated with CAISO pricing and taking power away from the IOU with CCAs but then the CPUC doesn’t give purchasing power to those entities in order to price what they value. Politically, electeds in CA talk like everything should be solar and batteries with a robust demand response based pricing mechanism that shapes demand behavior based on generation but that’s nowhere near what is actually getting done. On the other hand this is not complicated to execute but regulatory capture is real. Take a look at PG&E a formerly (2x) bankrupt utility with junk credit rating convicted of multiple felonies, what did they lose when they last filed for BK from a regulatory perspective?
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Climate As Top 4 Issue. Joe Biden gave his nomination acceptance speech late last night at the DNC. Standing alone in an empty arena behind a podium the former Vice President and Senator outlined the 4 great issues facing our country. A pandemic, economic downturn, racial injustice and acceleration of the climate crisis. In this SolarWakeup forum, climate is a top issue, it is our call to action so to hear it elevated to the last speech on the last day of a party convention gives me hope that the issue now has the platform we’ve been calling for. The work doesn’t end here, more work has to be done so whether your work is through Clean Energy for Biden, local campaigns or advocacy or talking about this issue to republican members, your voice is as important as ever. As Biden laid out, the climate crisis is the problem with an opportunity to create millions of great paying jobs and cause the investment of trillions of dollars.
California’s Energy PR Debate. Who is to blame for the multiple stage 3 emergencies causing rolling blackouts in California? The debate rages online. Couple of data points. The first emergency started at 7pm, yet solar is somehow to blame for this emergency. Secondly, there was more natural gas feeding the grid this Friday evening than the same Friday in the last two years. The argument is that renewable energy advocates are so powerful in California that regulators had to also cancel fossil fuel development and generation. CPUC, CAISO and CEC signed a letter stating that renewables were not to blame.
The Jobs In CleanTech. The governor of New Mexico is on Axios to talk about jobs in clean energy and I urge job training entities in solar to get themselves ready and professionalize their outreach to legislators. Solar, wind and the energy transition will cause changes that impact real people’s lives. Coal plant operators will lose jobs and so will miners and train operators for example. We must be a welcoming industry with training and great paying jobs, which I know we are, but not everyone does.
The Money In Solar. SolSystems buys $200million in North Carolina projects, Blackstone injects $300million in residential solar loans and DOE advances perovskite R&D. Not bad for a Thursday.
Batteries In Market. Yesterday you read about the LS Power battery in San Diego, the largest in the world. Based on reporting the plant only had an RA contract but operated on a merchant basis through the energy crisis. In Texas there were also several battery plants operating without existing off take agreements. It is entirely possible that the annual revenue projection in the model was achieved in a weekend.
Buyer’s Group Update. For the second week in a row the buyer’s group has doubled in size. This is a program for installers by leveraging the aggregate scale in volume which levels the playing field while returning margin to installers across the Country. Through transparent pricing that we are actively negotiating with supply chain, you can not only see the trend line but actually lower your COGS. Join today at solarwakeup.com/pricing
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