This is your SolarWakeup for June 7th, 2018
How Big Will Florida Be? Big! Here’s a couple of things to consider when you think about Florida. First, it’s a really, really big State. It takes 8 hours to drive from Miami to Tallahassee which justifies the 3rd highest usage of electricity in the Country. Second, the building codes here are as tough as they come because of a long history of hurricanes destroying homes. As such, the building officials care about the installation methods and products used, so I expect a quick stop to any subpar installation methods. Third, and most important, ‘everyone’ in Florida wants solar on their home. This is based on being in the Sunshine State and the fact that Floridians have a unique view on consumerism, more on that soon.
Consumers Come First For IPPs. NRG is shedding its power plants, the fossil ones this time. Earlier, NRG had announced it was selling its solar business to a private equity invest at the pressure of an activist investment firm. Getting rid of fossil fuel power plants is the trillion dollar game of hot potato for IPPs and that was foreseeable years ago. Much of the David Crane strategy centered around de-carbonization of the fleet but was also rooted on the fact that coal was finished. This time Wall Street is buying into the strategy, given that that customers are as well. Next step is getting back into EVs so that NRG comes full circle and gives Crane a board seat for his vision.
A Story About Tesla. It’s not all race cars and rocket ships at Tesla. At the shareholder meeting, Tesla announced it has reached a cumulative energy storage capacity of 1GWh. Given the average size of the systems, that is quite impressive and adds a level or storage scale to the company trying to lower the cost of batteries for car buyers. Look back at today as a funny milestone, because it’s so small, compared to what’s coming up.
What’s Next For Trump’s Coal Bailout. The immediate next step is likely a hearing or directive from FERC to the ISOs that will be subject to the coal bailout. It’s also indicative of the absurdity that Exelon came out with a statement against the policy. Good coverage from GTM on the legal aspects of the case.
The Jobs Of The Future. Not too many Wells Fargo carriage coachmen around anymore. That’s what happened when Ford came out with the Model T and the innovation that followed. Solar and wind plus batteries will replace much of the central power plant portfolio. Each time the innovation changes a fundamental sector, jobs have to adapt. The blacksmith became a toolsmith and so on. The same is true for internal combustion motor manufacturing sector, it is going to go away as EVs take the segment over. That is a reality of the future of work, but it isn’t going to happen overnight and economies must plan for it.
Sponsor SolarWakeup Live! Chicago. Join a great crowd of sponsors and attendees for the Chicago event on June 21st. We have a few more sponsorship slots left, email me for more info. Tickets at solarwakeuplive.com
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for June 6th, 2018
Are You Registered? Our Chicago event is coming up soon and you will not want to miss this because the who’s who of solar is flying in for the full day event. Get your tickets at solarwakeuplive.com and do it quickly because only about half of the tickets are left. This will definitely sell out before event day.
What Can A Major Do For You? My operating assumption is that the solar and storage ecosystem is going to be surrounded by ‘majors’ from oil, auto and energy. Look at the cap tables for energy storage companies that haven’t been acquired yet, it’s the who’s who of anyone that things the future of energy is based on intermittent generation. Look at the solar companies that have regional or segmented platforms and they are being acquired to be turned into a bigger platform to achieve goals like deploying capital or tax liabilities. What would your company look like if a major corporation invested or bought it, what would it allow or deny your team to accomplish?
Can Puerto Rico Attract Investment. I worry about Puerto Rico, even a year after Hurricane Maria destroyed much of the infrastructure. The problem isn’t about what can be done or what should be done. My concern is how it can be deployed financially. Puerto Rico isn’t in a financial position to spend the billions it takes to rebuild with renewable microgrids and it hasn’t fixed the underlying credit problem that would allow outside investors to be comfortable with the risk.
China Slows, What’s Next? This is the question I asked myself all day yesterday. If China’s market slows and there is an oversupply of modules what does that mean for the US market. This could spell a 2018 where prices reduce dramatically in the US from the oversupply but it could also mean issues around supply chain that can be bad for quality. Stay tuned…
A Greener Hawaii. Forget 100% renewable energy, Hawaii is looking to go carbon neutral in the next 20 years. Lots of work ahead but definitely achievable for this island paradise.
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for June 5th, 2018
Strategic Reduction In China’s Solar Market? China’s solar market is in for a shocking halt after an announcement by the governing body last week. Most of the publicly traded solar companies had a bad day yesterday after being downgraded on the change in subsidy policies that kept that capacity flowing at a massive pace. Let’s see how that affects the market pricing in the US, the oversupply could create competition that will center around pricing for the domestic projects. BUT I wouldn’t be surprised if there isn’t an impact that tries to stop the oversupply from coming this way given the 201 and AD/CVD tariffs are all percentage based charges.
Big EV Infra. I was amiss in speaking about this when it happened over the weekend but multiple regulatory bodies in CA and NY approved over $1billion in EV charging infrastructure to be built by the utilities. This is a massive upside for utilities that not only get to rate base the infrastructure, something I support, but also benefit from the increased load this will create from the EV adoption curve that this will cause since consumers will no longer worry about range. The conversation with regulators should be that any increased demand should be supplied with solar and storage and not rate based power generation.
Will The Consumers See This? The Trump coal and nuclear bailouts are going to cost money but the cost isn’t bourne by taxpayers but it may cause a two stage impact. The first level is similar to steel and aluminum tariffs with manufacturers and will affect the retail energy companies. Some may not have a way to pass the additional cost to the consumers while they are under contract and consumers that are about to renew will be in for a shocking price increase. Not only will consumers pay the actual increase but there will be a regulatory risk premium that otherwise would not have been there in a rational market. The price of the unknown is sometimes bigger than the actual price increase especially when a risk committee has to think about crazy possibilities.
Settling In North Carolina. Environmental and solar groups settled with Duke on their grid modernization efforts which were originally slated for greater than $7billion and settled at $2.5billion with some pro renewables policies attached. This comes in parallel with some leading indicators that Duke may be trying to stop energy storage to be added to solar projects, more on that to come.
Climate Change Financing Risk. Do you look at the climate change risk of a property that you are looking to fund a deal on? How do you do it and have you lost a deal because of it?
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for June 4th, 2018
Solar In Illinois. The Illinois Power Agency is looking to finalize the adjustable block program which will be key to the distributed and community solar markets in the midwest’s solar market. SolarWakeup Live will start the full day looking into the market with the director of the IPA, which on June 21st will likely have the rules finalized, so that you can get on the ground and moving forward. We have a few more sponsor spots for the event (email me) and tickets are available at solarwakeuplive.com.
Coal Collusion. Looks like coal magnate, Bob Murray, got what he wanted from Trump on the 1-year anniversary of announcing the departure of the Paris agreement. The best response going around about this announcement is from the PJM twitter account. To date, PJM has not been notified by governing agencies to prop up coal plants yet but expect that to happen. The way for the government to really prop up these plants without picking winners would also cause the value of solar generation to increase which then causes the demise of coal to quicken. So here we are, throwing wind to the free market, rules be damned.
Arizona Plea Deals Rejected. This is your reminder that the original sin in fighting solar net metering is still embroiled in a federal grand jury investigation. Now there’s news that a former regulator and lobbyist are rejecting plea deals in the case. When I read this, I can’t help but to think of the many ex parte communications happening every day across the Country and we may be better off when the power isn’t concentrated to the monopolies anymore. Just a thought.
Thoughts On NV Energy. The gigawatt of solar represents the value of solar in high irradiance areas, like Nevada. Also, I’d be amazed if storage isn’t closer to 2GWh than the 400MWh outlined in the proposal. Let’s revisit this in a few years.
Slowing Chinese Solar. New rules from the Chinese government have caused a few people off guard. This is perhaps a sign of the strength of the global markets. Imagine what else would be possible with the trade wars.
Quality Of Resi Solar. Australia has been growing distributed solar in a big way and a lot of it has to do with the ease of installing solar on homes. Little delay between selling and installation means consumers are happy. With the ability to review the installs later on, gives the consumer advocate a way to make sure installers are doing a good job and there is some work to do. In the US, we need to do more to get closer to an instant solar process. We also need to do more in having the solar industry regulated by solar experts. We will be discussing this in much greater detail this summer but ponder how the solar industry could ensure that consumers are getting great solar.
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for June 1st, 2018
Bad wifi on the plane means no column this morning. Have a great weekend and I will see you all on Monday. Let’s get ready for a strong June to close our Q2 in a great way! SolarWakeuplive.com to register for our Chicago event.
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for May 31st, 2018
Learn This, Import License Fee. Here is the thing for you to think about going forward with the global solar economy. As we read about new plants in the US, product is coming and going across borders. Silicon, wafers, cells, glass, back sheets etc, are made all over the world. Some innovative companies like SunPower will have an onshore/offshore strategy which creates the best blend of lead times, cost of goods and types of products the market wants. Tariffs just increase the cost of the products across the value chain and nobody benefits. If instead, we had an import license fee on modules, the market would be able to pay for local module assembly manufacturing. Any module that comes into the market from abroad would create a pool of capital from the ILF that gets distributed to domestic manufacturers. So using an example that has both on and off shore manufacturing equally, the manufacturer ends up basically being tariff free. This ensures the solar market gets low cost solar while benefitting local manufacturing. Best of both worlds!
Growing Choice In Illinois. As policy fights in energy come up, I see a natural ally for solar in the retail energy companies. Utilities see this alignment as well and fight the consumer choice rules that allow retail energy providers to compete for consumers’ business. This is happening in Illinois right now. As a tangent, this affects community solar in a big way because the rules could overlap. Learn more about community solar and adjustable block grants in Illinois at SolarWakeup Live! Chicago on June 21st. Early bird pricing ends today so get your ticket today!
EVs For Everyone. EVs everywhere, that is a future of our transportation sector that I can get behind. This isn’t just for your Tesla owners, this is a 40x growth of where we are today in the next 10 years. The future includes electric buses and scooters in addition to cars. Add this to the retirement of coal and gas peaker plants, we’re going to need a lot of solar to be built in that same time frame.
Solar Powered Peaches. Hanwha is setting up an assembly plant in Georgia which is great news. I will note once more, this has very little to do with 201. This has to do with the value of supply chain and the growth of the markets on the East Coast. The Jacksonville and Savannah ports are massive distribution hubs with rail that goes up and down the coast. 201 supporters can save their happy dance for another argument.
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for May 30th, 2018
The Bridge Fuel To Solar. Utilities and IPPs, like Vista Energy, are showing the future of the grid by announcing intentions to build more solar and less natural gas. If natural gas was the bridge fuel, the future costs of solar and storage may be the land on the other side of the moat. This is a space to keep your eyes on as a critical power market intent, especially when it comes from IPPs that benefit from more consumer retail choice. Having forward thinking allies on our side could be a great partnership in the future.
Policy Advocacy Works. SolarCity used to spend a ton of human and financial capital on policy in the US, on their own and in partnership with advocacy groups. Since the acquisition by Tesla, the company has been quieter on policy, not necessarily absent but a lot quieter. With the news out of Australia, it appears that it may be a US internal policy to stay out of the limelight but this is a great reminder that policy advocacy is an important part of our work. Can you commit one hour of legislative outreach in June? Meet with a State rep, Member of Congress or your mayor?
Great Benchmark In Haiti. Having lived in South Florida for most of my life it’s great to see some positive news out of Haiti. Glad to show off the results of solar leaders that have pushed for more solar to be built their and drive some economic growth in the space.
Cost Of Inaction. Trillions of lost economic growth due to inaction on climate issues. This is on top of the cost of inaction that drive more damage to our society and infrastructure. Pennywise, pound foolish is the saying you are looking for.
Taking It Up A Notch. Bam! Vote Solar, ELPC, SEIA, and others are appealing the Michigan commissions decision to approve the DTE natural gas plant. At the very least I hope that the legal tie-up lasts long enough for DTE to see the virtue in our argument and rescind the request to build the gas plant.
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for May 29th, 2018
A Solar Pro In Congress! On Friday I interviewed SolarCity alum, Sam Jammal. Sam is running for Congress in California 39th district and has a primary election coming up. Sam is imminently qualified and I can’t help but think of the opportunities the solar industry would have to leverage a solar pros influence in Congress. Check out my podcast interview with Sam.
The Tariff Impact. The reality of the tariffs is that our industry would be able to grow much faster without them. I’ve spoken to countless solar companies and one of my questions is always, what does your business look like if solar panels were low 30’s. I’d love to see an import license fee that is distributed to US manufacturers.
The Florida Market. We covered the Sunrun request to the Florida PSC in detail last month. Now VIvint Solar is going for their own approval by the PSC in Florida. The reason may be an abundance of caution given that Sunrun received the approval, not the lease in general. In detail, the two documents may be different in some form.
Midwest Interconnection Rules. IREC, ELPC and Fresh Energy have pushed Minnesota for better interconnection rules and have gotten some of the way there. These updates always remind me there are quiet warriors fighting for the rules and regulations that allow the solar industry to exist.
Illinois Deals. Illinois is going to be a multi 100MW market next year and there is some of it available to you. From residential and C&I behind the meter to large scale and community solar, the market rules are being finalized. At SolarWakeup Live! you will hear from ELPC’s Brad Klein and Illinois Power Authority’s Anthony Star amongst many industry participants. This amazing one-day event is a must attend if you want to play in Illinois.
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for May 25th, 2018
As you enter this long weekend, make sure to think about how you and your business can help the veterans of our armed services. I know that our industry does quite a bit in the form of training and hiring veterans but let us all take a moment and see how we can do more.
Your Privacy, Our Privacy Policy. Take this as your official notification of our privacy policy, which is also the privacy policy of Mailchimp, our email service provider. As always, we appreciate your readership and hope that we are always providing content that you find valuable. Of course, you can always unsubscribe by clicking the link below. I promise that I only think less of you for just a few minutes.
Complicated C&I Projects. I wanted to make sure to point out some recent announcements of success for Black Bear Energy. Many of you know Drew from BBE and his work from Prologis and now Black Bear. He’s been working hard for a long time to get large property owners to do more solar and this set of relatively small projects in multiple States shows that the hard work is paying off.
Growth In Residential. Nice interview by Bloomberg with Sunnova’s CEO, John Berger, about the California residential market. It is becoming incredibly clear, as California slapped down an anti-solar piece of legislation this week, that residential solar advocates cannot stop fighting until retail rate net metering and retail choice for consumers is available in every State. Moreover, anyone that is in solar but not residential should advocate for those same exact rules. Because if you want solar to grow you need non-solar professionals to advocate for your issue.
Growth In Community Solar. See above, this is a perfect example of a jealous neighbor with his shaded roof wanting to get solar as well. If they can’t put the panels on the roof then they’ll sign up for community solar.
Have a great weekend, before you leave for your vacation please make sure your colleagues are reading SolarWakeup and book your ticket to visit us in Chicago for SolarWakeup Live! on June 21st.
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for May 24th, 2018
Solar Goes For Meghan Nutting! We are just a few weeks away from the June 26th primary election for Meghan Nutting. Meghan is running for Colorado’s 5th District in the State House and she is also the VP of Public Policy for Sunnova. She’s been a solar advocate to advance our industry and now is the time for all of us to come together and put Meghan into the State House to represent Denver. First, help her raise money and send $5, which you can do here. Second, if you have friends in Denver, you have to get them to help her knock on doors. This race gets decided in the primary so we have just a few weeks away. If you want to learn more about Meghan, you can listen to my interview with her.
Elon’s Twitter Rant, My 2 Cents. Elon went on a twitter rant yesterday about the media. One of his points was that much of the coverage is negative and when it comes to all things Tesla, negative headlines get a lot of clicks. How do I know? I have the unique vantage point of being able to compare many outlets and many headlines. Unlike publications that can only compare one headline over another through internal A/B testing, we have the ability to track headlines across publications. The truth is that headlines matter more to readers than the publication and any story that is about a bankruptcy, problem or negative issue gets significantly more traction than anything else. Case in point, the story this week about Cypress Creek cancelling projects was clicked by almost every person that clicked any story at all.
My First Solar Project. Hats off to Portland for going out for an RFP to drive the best deal possible for its customers. Two of my first solar projects were in Portland, one for Nike and one with Portland Gas and Electric. Fun times!
Value Of Solar, Infinite. $20k to go. $20k left to raise to help save over 200 babies over the next year in a single hospital in Sierra Leone. Because of unreliable power, almost half of the babies that go into the NICU in the hospital pass away. $20k is less than $5 per reader today, so skip the Starbucks and send the money. Please!
New Jersey Bills Signed. Frank has your coverage on the bill signing in NJ, keeps an important market going forward and creates a few new opportunities for solar to develop projects.
Big Oil + Storage + Solar. Another oil investment into storage, this time Shell into Sonnen. Keep watching the trend of auto, IPPs and oil converging around solar + storage. Sparkspread reported that a storage developer with pipeline went into market for acquisition yesterday, if you have info about that, let me know.
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Yann