Solar sells. Super Bowl 51 was inside NRG Stadium and last I checked there are few companies with as much coal and natural gas power plant in their portfolio. As the company was gearing up their PR for their big day, it was the solar power deal with the stadium that was the highlight. In a regional ad, Florida Power & Light had a commercial implying the need for natural gas baseload while showing their solar farms. Maybe companies are trying to tap into the 80% approval ratings enjoyed by solar.

Let’s Get Real. I’m a pretty positive guy but I also get rather annoyed at companies that make everything sound easy and great. Smoothing over the difficulties of this market is silly, nobody is buying it. This is especially true with storage and the new executives of Sonnen should be more careful with their PR. After a rather loud exit from the former US CEO as he went to Mercedes, I would expect management to be a bit more subdued. Storage is hard, let’s not sugar coat things. Same goes for solar companies, if margins are terrible, say so. Investors aren’t buying your talking points anyways as you share your books with them during a raise. The media is complicit in this. Bankers inside capital processes always leak and tell us the real story but we often act as cheerleaders and don’t want to write something that would be detrimental to our markets.

Solar sells. Super Bowl 51 was inside NRG Stadium and last I checked there are few companies with as much coal and natural gas power plant in their portfolio. As the company was gearing up their PR for their big day, it was the solar power deal with the stadium that was the highlight. In a regional ad, Florida Power & Light had a commercial implying the need for natural gas baseload while showing their solar farms. Maybe companies are trying to tap into the 80% approval ratings enjoyed by solar.

Let’s Get Real. I’m a pretty positive guy but I also get rather annoyed at companies that make everything sound easy and great. Smoothing over the difficulties of this market is silly, nobody is buying it. This is especially true with storage and the new executives of Sonnen should be more careful with their PR. After a rather loud exit from the former US CEO as he went to Mercedes, I would expect management to be a bit more subdued. Storage is hard, let’s not sugar coat things. Same goes for solar companies, if margins are terrible, say so. Investors aren’t buying your talking points anyways as you share your books with them during a raise. The media is complicit in this. Bankers inside capital processes always leak and tell us the real story but we often act as cheerleaders and don’t want to write something that would be detrimental to our markets.

Opinion

News

Have a great day!
Yann

The links. It is not lost on me that I promised something yesterday that I failed to deliver on. We are working on it again today, some process adjustments are in the works. If the links below are in blue, then you can bypass the website.
Make those cuts. Enphase announced yesterday that it would reduce staff by 75 positions or about 19%, mostly in the California HQ. I always empathize with those that are laid off. On the other hand the moves typically save the remaining jobs as the company drives its way to profitability. One point to note when I read the filing was that Enphase (after raising $10mm) engaged McKinsey to consult on the moves. Not exactly the most prudent use of money in that regard.
Charm City Politics. Maryland is trying to override the veto from Governor Hogan on the expansion of the RPS. It’s odd that Maryland has a republican Governor but the State has a pretty diverse population with the Eastern Shore and Western Maryland. I’d love to see more thoughtful talking points from Republican politicians on these things. Blah blah blah tax increases, blah blah blah consumers just doesn’t do it for me. How about: “Maryland has complicated electric infrastructure served by PJM on the Eastern Shore with aging infrastructure and grid congestion that would be better served by working with local IPPs; while the rest of the State has regulated investor owned utilities and municipal power agencies. My plan would be to work with the utilities to replace (read ratebase) aging, dirty power plants with cleaner power including the use of central and distributed renewable energy that give consumers more choice on their energy supply and costs.” No need to thank me Governor Hogan!
Out of the ‘woods’. NRG has gotten the Ivanpah power station up to minimum production levels. The entity operating the system was in forbearance for nearly a year but now the approximate 65 full time on site technicians have operated themselves into the sunlight. I guess haters will have to start writing about birds again…

Opinion

News

Have a great day!
Yann

The links are live. Let’s try this out. Starting today, until further notice, the emails will have the links right in the email. That means you don’t have to go to the website to route yourself to the article you find interesting. That means that I am hurting the one metric that would allow me to monetize which is web clicks but I am doing it to improve your experience. What can you do for me? Help me get more subscribers! Tell your friends and make your employees subscribe.
Watch this space! Over 110 actions against solar net metering were taken up by utilities across the US in 2015 and 2016. The losses for solar could be counted on one hand. While for some reason I am in the minority in this thinking, I am convinced that it is because the industry played politics. And it wasn’t SEIA or the State Chapters. It was the controversial funding of non-profits with grey money, the tactics of TASC and the audacity of small business owners picketing the commissions to save their companies. I sincerely hope that we are not descending into the desire to play policy instead of politics but I think I am wrong. Just look at where we are in Arizona and the headline in Maine from yesterday. Someone please tell me I am wrong.
Chasing returns in known knowns. Here is what we know. University endowments had a terrible year, with 805 colleges average a return of negative 1.9%. If public disclosures show us those kinds of returns, I bet the private funds and pension funds didn’t fare much better. With solar returns well above 5% unlevered, you KNOW that you can get some money put to work with nice profits. Always the chicken and the egg because it’s not that easy to put $5billion to work in our industry but they can always send it my way and I’ll point them in the right direction J.
More SunShot love. I will keep praising SunShot because they’ve done great work and continue to with another $30million announcement yesterday. What Minh Le is bringing up is totally valid, there is not political reason to get rid of SunShot but there is a corporate reason, the Kochs just don’t like innovation that threatens them. Is it a big enough fish for the GOP to cut? Yes. Is it a big enough fight for the Dems in the Senate to force it to be funded? 50/50.

Opinion

News

Have a great day!
Yann