This is your SolarWakeup for March 26th, 2019
Presented by ENGIE Storage. (formerly Green Charge) helps power the world more efficiently and sustainably. As the nation’s number one distributed energy storage company, we serve energy producers, distributors, and consumers, including utilities, network operators, and energy consumers in business and government.
Here is the Recap of SolarWakeup Live! happening today. This is the biggest agenda in the history of SolarWakeup Live! in the 6th edition in just 18 months. I will be interviewing 10 leaders in the solar and clean tech space in one-day, many of the conversations going up as podcasts. Starting the day with a conversation about SMART and how the implementation is going with some pushback from the utilities. I will also look to see what SMART 2.0 looks like. We also engage in a roundtable discussion about community solar and the role utilities and regulators play in the process. This will be a great day of discussion and networking here in Boston.
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for March 25th, 2019
Presented by CleanChoice Energy. The premier community solar and renewable retail energy service provider in the United States. CleanChoice’s marketing, sales, and operations teams offer the most comprehensive customer acquisition, retention and management service to community solar asset owners and developers in the market today. CleanChoice aspires to make renewable energy accessible to all, working with more than 40 partners in every community solar market. Our regulatory team is working to expand the community solar market and uses our relationships in state capitols to benefit our partners. The company is one of the fastest growing businesses in America, as ranked on the Inc. 500 and Deloitte’s Technology Fast 500™. For more information, visit CleanChoiceEnergy.com
Keeping PG&E Deals Alive. Ever since PG&E filed for bankruptcy, I’ve been warning that it would be more expensive and possibly impossible to do deals where PG&E is the off taker. This became more of an issue when the courts said that FERC couldn’t make itself a 3rd party to the restructuring of contracts between generators and the utility. If the energy storage project developer is really worried about getting the deal done, I wonder if they are seeking a potential buyer. I would be a buyer of this type of project at the right price.
EV’s Create Alignment. The next decade is going to make electric vehicles the norm and for the first time in a long time, auto OEMs need to work together on standards and with suppliers to get the infrastructure right. Until the volume is high enough, OEMs will buy batteries from 3rd parties. Look at Tesla, they had to build their own battery plant to shore up their supply chain. You can also think about how this affects the solar industry and the build out of this infrastructure. You have relationships with home and building owners that are installing or already have installed solar. They may be interested to be part of the infrastructure that the transportation sector is looking for.
Portfolios Are Moving. Large owners of assets are moving them into new ownership, taking some of their cash gains off the table and raising new cash. I will be looking for the next iteration of asset purchases from one pension fund to another, this would signal a desire to create upside in something other than having cheaper cost of capital.
See You Tomorrow. Tomorrow is SolarWakeup Live! Boston. I look forward to seeing many of you there.
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for March 22nd, 2019
Presented by Pfister Energy. Changing the way energy is generated and delivered. Pfister Energy is a leading turnkey design-build renewable energy solutions company. Servicing C&I, community and utility sectors for solar, storage and O&M. Visit pfisterenergy.com for more information
Weekend Reading. Thank you for the comments on the ITC, more to come on that soon, potentially in the form of follow up questions or a survey. Make sure to go back to yesterday’s New York Times column on the massive flooding in the midwest which is devastating rural communities and family farms. Reading the Canadian Solar results makes me realize just how fragile this market is, even after a great quarter and aggressive plan, investors still long for bigger margins and diversity.
See You Next Week. If you are coming to SolarWakeup Live! on Tuesday, make sure to send me your questions for the speakers. See you Tuesday!
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for March 21st, 2019
Presented by CleanChoice Energy. The premier community solar and renewable retail energy service provider in the United States. CleanChoice’s marketing, sales, and operations teams offer the most comprehensive customer acquisition, retention and management service to community solar asset owners and developers in the market today. CleanChoice aspires to make renewable energy accessible to all, working with more than 40 partners in every community solar market. Our regulatory team is working to expand the community solar market and uses our relationships in state capitols to benefit our partners. The company is one of the fastest growing businesses in America, as ranked on the Inc. 500 and Deloitte’s Technology Fast 500™. For more information, visit CleanChoiceEnergy.com.
March Madness Last Chance. Head to ESPN Tournament Challenge, login and search for the SolarWakeup group. The password is Solar100 to get your entry. Of course, the winner gets to write the rundown for a day! Tournament kicks off around noon, so join now or forever regret missing this chance!
Maryland RPS. The increase in RPS passed the Senate and is going to the house where it has 74 co sponsors. According to one local advocacy expert, it has a decent chance to get through the house before it heads to the GOP Governor’s desk potentially. It still needs centrist democrats in a diverse State to make the bill a success and it’s not a done deal.
Infocast San Diego. As trillions of dollars and 250 gigawatts of pipeline gather in San Diego for the annual get together, I joined at the last minute for some meetings. For those of you that I saw, it was good to see you and sorry if I missed the rest of you. This event is an impressive gathering each year though I get to speak with most attendees through this platform every day, having a dialogue from time to time is helpful. I hope it was fruitful and you are discussing the importance of the ITC in your dealmaking.
ITC. Over 100 of you responded to the questions over the past few days. I will take the weekend to digest your feedback and speak with folks in the lobbying effort. If there is a lack of alignment, I will let you know and it will be up to the entire industry to push for what you’re looking for. Don’t forget, in 2014, the solar industry was NOT aligned on what to do with the ITC and it may not be aligned today either. At least not yet.
Front Lines Of Climate Change. “I’m looking at global warming — I don’t need to see the graphs,” said Hamburg’s mayor, Cathy Crain, referring to the role of climate change in increasing the frequency of extreme weather events. After two record-setting floods in a single decade, Ms. Crain said, “I’m living it and everybody else here is living it.”
Come To Live! Email me for the coupon code to make a last minute trip. The agenda is the best we’ve had and networking is shaping up to be top notch as well.
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for March 20th, 2019
Presented by ENGIE Storage. (formerly Green Charge) helps power the world more efficiently and sustainably. As the nation’s number one distributed energy storage company, we serve energy producers, distributors, and consumers, including utilities, network operators, and energy consumers in business and government.
March Madness Bracket Challenge. Join SolarWakeup readers from around the world in guessing their bracket. If you think you know NCAA basketball you are already in last place! Head to ESPN Tournament Challenge, login and search for the SolarWakeup group. The password is Solar100 to get your entry. Of course, the winner gets to write the rundown for a day! We had some technical issues yesterday so try once more before the tipoff on Thursday mid day.
What Does The ITC Mean To You? Over 50 responses to these questions yesterday and that is incredibly helpful. We have 5 times as many people in the SolarWakeup family the last time we took on DC and signed the SolarPledge, which played a central role in getting the ITC extended the first time. Here are the questions, I’d like your feedback on so we can start our mission. Are you worried about the step-down of the ITC? Are you in the camp that believes the solar market will be better off without the ITC? Who’s hurt the most by a step-down and eventual sunset of the ITC, utility scale, residential or commercial? What do you want SEIA and advocates to do? Leave as is, fight to keep at 30% or something else? Will you see your business suffer if the ITC steps down to 26%? I want your feedback so I can do a reality check on my personal view on the topic.
Likely CEO At PG&E. Bill Johnson is the current CEO at TVA and the former CEO of Progress Energy (which merged with Duke), and likely the next CEO of PG&E. This is as anti-climactic of an appointment that you could hope for. Progress Energy is known for the original nuclear boondoggle in Florida and TVA has not gone the way of the rest of the country when it comes to renewables, quite the opposite, the solar stories out of TVA are not very favorable. Let’s see where this goes from here.
Need More In Maryland. My second home is Maryland and I’m looking forward to the day that Maryland solar policy really kicks in high gear. Politically, Maryland is a complicated State even though its relatively small. DC suburbs to the Eastern Shore and Western Maryland create a diverse barrier to the Baltimores, City and County. I hope the advocates get some luck coming their way and I look forward to spending more time in the State once again.
One Of A Kind. Here’s the rundown for SolarWakeup Live next week. A legislator looking to go to 100% renewables, the CEO of the nation’s largest clean tech incubator, a Vote Solar pro, 3 of the leading community solar experts, opportunity zone financing, the Director in charge of the SMART program and one of the largest developers in the world. That’s what you get at Live! in a single day. I hope to see you in Boston next week and making this another great SolarWakeup event.
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for March 19th, 2019
Presented by Pfister Energy. Changing the way energy is generated and delivered. Pfister Energy is a leading turnkey design-build renewable energy solutions company. Servicing C&I, community and utility sectors for solar, storage and O&M. Visit pfisterenergy.com for more information
Tournament Challenge, 2019 Edition. Get ready to compete again for 2019! Last year it came down to the final day between Allie Detrio (Engie), Tom Matzzie (CleanChoice), and Nathan Arbitman (DSM) with Nathan coming out on top at the very end. This year, you’ll be able to join your solar friends to show your skills (luck) in picking this year’s NCAA March Madness winner. With everyone bound to pick Duke as the winner, the details will matter more than ever. Or go with another winner in the hopes to zig when the market zags. Head to ESPN Tournament Challenge, login and search for the SolarWakeup group. The password is Solar100 to get your entry. Of course, the winner gets to write the rundown for a day!
What Does The ITC Mean To You? Nothing in the news on the topic but the discussion has been circling my inbox since my comments last week about solar being left out of the Senate extenders package. Are you worried about the step-down of the ITC? Are you in the (small) camp that believes the solar market will be better off without the ITC? Who’s hurt the most by a step-down and eventual sunset of the ITC, utility scale, residential or commercial? What do you want SEIA and advocates to do? Leave as is, fight to keep at 30% or something else? I want your feedback so I can do a reality check on my personal view on the topic.
A Disservice To America. Kentucky is doing a disservice to its residents by killing its solar market. Solar in Kentucky was well on the way to do like Texas and Florida, compete with electricity with no subsidy whatsoever. It would have created an excellent opportunity for job training and good paying jobs with upward mobility through local small businesses. Instead, at the bidding of the incumbent coal and utility market, Kentucky is going to keep those opportunities from the residents in Kentucky.
Community Solar Future. It’s always been surprising to me that California doesn’t have a robust community solar market. There was a recent project that mirrored the concept outside of the rules but the attempts to do community solar have fallen short. We’ll be talking about the state of community solar growth across the Country with a rockstar panel at SolarWakeup Live! next week. Just one more week until we get together in Boston. The agenda is long and thorough, we added another room to get a few more people into the event which area always very good networking. Email me for a special code to get into the event by hitting reply or go to solarwakeuplive.com
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for March 18th, 2019
Presented by CleanChoice Energy. The premier community solar and renewable retail energy service provider in the United States. CleanChoice’s marketing, sales, and operations teams offer the most comprehensive customer acquisition, retention and management service to community solar asset owners and developers in the market today. CleanChoiceaspires to make renewable energy accessible to all, working with more than 40 partners in every community solar market. Our regulatory team is working to expand the community solar market and uses our relationships in state capitols to benefit our partners. The company is one of the fastest growing businesses in America, as ranked on the Inc. 500 and Deloitte’s Technology Fast 500™. For more information, visit CleanChoiceEnergy.com.
What Is Big Oil Saying? Axios interviewed the CEO of Equinor and asked some climate related questions. The answers were less than interesting but I find myself looking for transitionary comments that guide action at the oil majors. Maybe we should be ignoring this but I view the oil companies as the natural successor to the hype we had with pension funds over the past few years. Oil companies are better with energy, the uncontracted upside and their knowledge of trading is a natural fit for our industry.
More Nuclear Bailout. Ohio and Pennsylvania look like the two next States that will be supplying nuclear power plant operators with some bailout policies. Especially on the East Coast, there is a lack of renewable energy density thus far with mediocre paces of development. Advocates for renewable will use this leverage to advance solar policies if they play their cards right, more likely to move the needle in PA than OH but both will have talks.
Kids Go Marching. On Friday, millions of kids around the world took their message of climate action to the streets. This is a generational message from future voters that they will not take over a planet that is in worse shape than it is today without trying to make it better. It is the responsibility of us and our elected officials to make everything a little bit better than it was given to us.
One Week Left. The SolarWakeup Live! agenda is final. We have a legislative sponsor of the 100% RPS bill joining us as well as Vote Solar’s representative for the State. Join us on March 26th. For more info, go to solarwakeuplive.com
Vote Solar Equinox. Don’t forget to join Vote Solar for the annual Equinox event in San Francisco. Get your ticket here
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for March 15th, 2019
Presented by ENGIE Storage. (formerly Green Charge) helps power the world more efficiently and sustainably. As the nation’s number one distributed energy storage company, we serve energy producers, distributors, and consumers, including utilities, network operators, and energy consumers in business and government.
Youth Climate Strike Day. My kids are staying in school but they are wearing a shirt in honor of the day that hopefully has an impact across the world. Their shirt is a quote from David Crane that he wrote in a letter to shareholders while the CEO of NRG Energy. “You Knew…and You Didn’t Do Anything About It? Why?” I hope that the kids will have an impact on elected officials to show that their decisions are not only for the next election but for 2 or 3 decades from now. A vote against solar or an RPS may not mean much for the politician but the impact will carry weight for years to come. The kids know what inaction means and today is a day to memorialize it.
Gary Cohn Tried. On the Freakonomics podcast, former advisor to the President Gary Cohn said that he tried to explain to Trump that solar and not coal was the future. During the tariff debate he showed that solar had hundreds of thousands of jobs, up from nothing ten years ago versus coal which is 50,000 and declining. This is in line with what I’ve been told from meetings with Cohn during the 201 tariff discussion.
12,000 Interconnections. Who’s ordering a Tesla Model Y? During last night’s unveiling Elon highlighted the company’s success including the vast supercharging network. The number now stands at over 12,000 chargers across the world which means that the team had to site, interconnect and build that many systems. Anyone that has had to deal with interconnections, especially my friends in the charging business can attest that this is no small feat.
Join Me In Boston. Here’s another chance to get your ticket, this isn’t a big theater and we have a few seats left to network and join me on stage at SolarWakeup Live! Boston. We’re talking policy, SMART, community solar and development. Use code SWLB20 for 20% off as a loyal SolarWakeup readers.
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for March 14th, 2019
Presented by Pfister Energy. Changing the way energy is generated and delivered. Pfister Energy is a leading turnkey design-build renewable energy solutions company. Servicing C&I, community and utility sectors for solar, storage and O&M. Visit pfisterenergy.com for more information
FERC Denied. The PG&E saga continues, now with a federal court denying FERC the jurisdiction it called for with regard to the PPAs. If you recall, NextEra had filed with FERC that the PPAs should be safe from the bankruptcy. This means that the issue becomes a political problem for Governor Newsom. If PG&E is able to cancel existing PPA contracts, it would create irreparable harm to solar in California and across the Country. The cost of solar would skyrocket and all goals that Newsom had planned for would be endangered.
Utility Startup Incubator. This is a smart move, a utility in the Midwest is starting a tech startup space to enable young companies to get started. Starting a company in energy is difficult and the funding mechanisms for startups in this space requires some traction before money is likely to come in. In the Northeast, the leader in this space is Greentown Labs led by Emily Reichert. Greentown Labs is the largest clean tech incubator in the Country with over 170 companies incubated that have raised over $320million in funding. Emily is joining me on stage at SolarWakeup Live! Boston to share her experiences and the work it takes to raise money in the space.
Oil Speaks Up GND. Energy executives at CERAWeek went on the record to talk about the Green New Deal and the fact that investors are asking the energy companies what their plan is to lower carbon emissions. Even Rick Perry agreed that AOC shouldn’t be castigated for wanting clean air and clean water. BP’s CEO said that there is a lack of progress on climate issues that investors are angry about. This continues the trend that will see cash rich companies looking for ways to have an impact, not make headline announcements. Big investments into companies that create a big impact on the overall company’s sustainability.
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for March 13th, 2019
Presented by CleanChoice Energy. empowering people and businesses to cut emissions, support renewable energy, and live cleaner lives. Founded in 2012, the company has become one of the fastest growing businesses in America, as ranked on the Inc. 500 and Deloitte’s Technology Fast 500™. CleanChoice Energy is a "Best for the World" Certified B Corporation, a member of the American Sustainable Business Council and the U.S. Green Building Council and is certified with the highest available rating by Green America's Green Business Network. For more information or to become a customer, visit CleanChoiceEnergy.com
Solar Market Grows. The market data for 2018 is out and the result is another double digit year with 2018 closing at 10.6GW. Residential market grew by 7 percent to 2.4GW while the utility scale had some headwinds from the tariffs. The forecast from Wood MacKenzie for 2019 is over 12GW.
New Mexico Joins Club. Congratulations to the advocacy teams in New Mexico as the legislature overwhelmingly passes a 100% by 2045 RPS bill. The Governor is eagerly waiting for the bill to arrive for her signature which will happen as quickly as possible. New Mexico joins Hawaii, California and D.C. in the 100% club with bills filed in several other States including Massachusetts. We will be digging into the details in Boston on the 26th to talk about what this means to the solar and storage markets.
More Name Changes. COSeia, the Colorado solar association, is changing its name. With a recent change in leadership, former SEPA staffer Mike Kruger, is now the President and CEO of the Colorado Solar and Storage Association. COSSA is now your State trade association and my hat goes off to the team for making the change.
PG&E, CPUC and More. There was a story in yesterday’s wakeup about the California Governor’s look inside the CPUC, potentially replacing one or more commissioners. Vote Solar’s Adam Browning opined on the news in this tweet. Adam is right, commissioners should come with or from the renewable energy or solar industry so that the industry that is tasked with changing the energy landscape has an internal expert.
Sec’s Pompeo and Perry Come To SPI. Just kidding of course, but that was my first thought when I saw that CNBC was interviewing both members of Trump’s cabinet at an energy conference. CERA Week is the Davos of energy with every major energy executive in Houston (just imagine what the tarmac at the airport looks like). There will be a day when the solar trade show brings major cabinet members to the event. There was on solar panel at CERA Week, some names you will recognize.
Welcome To Live! Join me and many of your market colleagues as we gather in Boston on March 26th. The speakers are getting ready to have a conversation about the current state of affairs and how SMART will roll out. You can see the full agenda at solarwakeuplive.com
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Yann