States Matter. A bit of a sweep across the NJ and VA elections as democrats have taken the mansion in NJ and retain it in VA. Solar is a bipartisan-supported issue at the voter level but GOP politicians have still hesitated to adopt pro-solar policies. To be fair, consumer cost has been used as an anti-solar excuse across party lines because the repercussion for not supporting solar isn’t there. But as our friends in Maryland would attest to, having a friendly vote in the Governor’s mansion goes a long way to passing legislation. Nobody wants to pass a bill against a veto threat.
280.Twitter now has a 280 character limit…
Solar Saves Lives.An important announcement yesterday about the future of energy in Puerto Rico and the rebuilding effort. In a call led by David Crane, President Bill Clinton announced the start of a coalition to raise funds and products to help bring energy to Puerto Rico and rebuild the grid in a better way. Solar Foundation is leading the operations and has set up the website solarsaveslives.org which gives you information on how to get involved.
Big Money Jobs. Cypress Creek Renewables has been making a lot of noise in the press recently. After announcing a billion dollars to be invested in Oregon, more coverage has come out on their investment in South Carolina. In coordination with the announcement, Cypress donated $25,000 to a technical college to build out the workforce. Investments and jobs are a good way to speak to policy makers.
Consumer Choice Modeling. It is interesting to see rating agencies look at the risk of consumers wanting something better as a negative corporate impact to companies like utilities. When the result of giving your customers something they want is negative to your business, your business model may be broken.
EV Tax Credit. Keep your eyes on the EV tax credit in the tax reform bill. Demand growth is the most important data point for power companies and cheaper EVs mean faster adoption which in turn creates demand growth. EEI is likely making or requesting that change on the hill right now.
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I’m in DC for the MDV-SEIA Solar Focus Conference. Join me on stage tomorrow to kick off the conference with a discussion on power markets, growth of community solar and policy.
South Korea. Trump is in South Korea which last week threatened a WTO complaint if the US creates a tariff under the 201 petition. Korea could also go on the defensive considering they have an important share of the energy storage market, which the US needs access to. With everyone on the agenda, it is doubtful that solar makes the conversation but I hope that it does.
FERC is Full. The Senate has confirmed the two final nominees for FERC including McIntyre from Jones Day who will be the next Chairman of the regulatory body. Last week we published a conversation with Wellinghoff, former Chairman of FERC, in which he discussed the odd precedent of the chief of staff being appointed by the White House.
Coal. ERCOT, a closed but competitive power market in Texas, is saying (through pricing) that coal plants are no longer market viable. On the other hand solar projects are being financed and contracted by corporate, municipal and utility offtakers. Now, the same company that closed two plants is buying generation assets which include ERCOT coal plants by acquiring Dynegy and its 30GW of capacity (most of which is gas).
Coal Subsidies. The reporting has been focused on Murray Energy and First Energy with their push for coal subsidies (resiliency payments) under the NOPR that DOE is pushing at FERC. Rick Perry said the $10billion plus of extra cost to consumers is the price of freedom. I don’t follow his logic since gas is made here and the sun shines for free.
Ratebased Solar.Florida continues the path to let monopolies own more solar. Unlike other markets where the price of solar drops through competition, utilities in Florida are not incentivized to get the lowest cost of solar and take advantage of the tax credit or deductions.
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First Speaker. SolarWakeup Live! DC is setting up to be a great lineup. Andrea Luecke, President and Executive Director of Solar Foundation, will be joining us on December 6th. Solar Foundation performs the important annual solar jobs census which is currently underway and recently released a report on diversity in the industry. More speakers announced soon.
Power Markets. You probably agree that solar needs to become a more active participant in the power markets. Whether you are doing an off-site PPA or selling power on the wholesale markets, there are questions you want to be educated on. On Tuesday, I’ll have the CEO of a power retail company on stage and I want your questions. What do you want to know and what is important to your business?
Climate Report. In 1990, Congress passed the Global Research Act which led to the release of the updated National Climate Assessment last week. This is a report initiated as a joint effort of over a dozen agencies and brings the administration to the mainstream. “It is extremely likely that human influence has been the dominant cause of the observed warming since the mid-20th century,” Furthermore: “For the warming over the last century, there is no convincing alternative explanation supported by the extent of the observational evidence.”
Twitter Trolling. The Rick Perry comments last week brought out a bit of a Twitter troll in me because ‘smart’ people were agreeing with Perry’s comments. Many people were making the point that electricity is good for society and its fight against crime. The problem is that solving this issue doesn’t require fossil fuels. I quickly found myself getting targeted by an ‘academic’ for arguing with Perry’s flawed logic. Money buys access and academia is not immune from it – which saddens me for the students of School of Public Policy at the University of Michigan.
Electrification Design. If you had to design a way to bring energy to an un-electrified village in Africa, how would you do it? Take into account the levels of service: lighting, cooking, cooling, etc – how would it work in your design and how much would it cost?
Clean Air/Clean Water. Pruitt is dismantling scientific advisory boards and replacing members with people that say things like, “air is too clean, children need to breath more irritants, in order to learn how to fight them.” Why is this not a political risk for politicians? Clean air polls very well except campaign advisors don’t seem to think it risky.
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Have a great weekend, I will be back in touch on Monday from DC where I will be interviewing Tom Matzzie from CleanChoice at Solar Focus Conference.
No, Don’t Say That. The highest hopes I had for Rick Perry was that he’d want to turn the entire country into an ERCOT market. Now he’s just an embarrassment considering his post is normally filled with some of the smartest people in the world. Let’s focus on the future where some of solar’s biggest innovators are electrifying developing Countries in amazing ways – in ways that central power plants could never do it.
Future of Peakers. Probably doesn’t include much gas. If you don’t get a capacity contract the cost of gas transmission/supply paired with the lack of dispatching will make your plant less than profitable. Starting with California, market spreads between retail and wholesale are ridiculous right now and pricing signals are showing that markets want to move away from gas peakers. The future looks towards storage especially when signals get into the microsecond level. How long before every solar plant has energy storage installed on it?
Cost Of Money and Jobs. Tariffs will cost jobs and fail to create a market benefit. How many jobs are we willing to pay to create nothing here? Let’s highlight the jobs that are located here that are working abroad. If you are a lawyer, investor, developer that is involved in foreign projects, let me know – we need to highlight this.
Trade War. South Korea is threatening a WTO case in response to US tariffs. What will China do? Silicon is a good case study of how jobs are lost when politicians try to play market development.
Ratebase Victory. The hurricane that caused me to lose two weeks of my life, caused many grey hairs and cost me thousands is about to cost me more in the form of higher electric bills. As the hurricane came through and snapped my power pole in half, utilities in Florida were calling the hurricane, Saint Irma. Every wire that fell, every truck that had to be called in – meant more cost that needed to be ratebased and repaid by the consumers (don’t forget to add the return on that ratebase).
Tax Reforms. Solar will be fine, if you want to worry, worry about the impact on depreciation value with a lower corporate tax rate. Building a pipeline is more important right now, the ITC is incredibly unlikely to go away.
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