This is your SolarWakeup for June 14th, 2017
Presented by T-Top Buddy, a product I created
Peak Coal? Production. Down. Consumption. Down. Globally, coal looks like it has hit its peak. Production is down over 6% globally and consumption is down almost 2%. New power plants are virtually non-existent, which can’t be good news for coal industry.
Appealing to the Base. Oil fell off the $100+ levels and settles at or below $50 per barrel. That didn’t bode well for some parts of the oil drilling sector especially in Texas. The Houston Chronicle looks at how solar saved the day for some hardworking Americans that are going from the oil fields to the solar farms. This comes right behind solar hiring hundreds in Virginia with no experience required. This is the argument that needs to come out in the 201 petition argument. Raise the cost of modules by any amount and hardworking families will suffer. SEIA needs to head down to Texas right now and make an ad, the Houston Chronicle did the hard work for you. If you want, you can hire me to do it for you.
CEOs want it, CFOs approve it. A lesson many of us learn very early in our solar careers and it’s never a bad idea to repeat it. Educating CFOs is part of the mission that we must all focus on every day. Nice message from GreenBiz as they head to Verge in Hawaii next week.
News
Opinions:
Have a great day!
Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for June 13th, 2017
Presented by T-Top Buddy, a perfect gift for Father’s Day.
Power loses to Healthcare. When the CEO of GE steps down, it has repercussions throughtout the giant company. It also creates some noise outside of the company to determine where the board, vis a vis shareholder value, sees the value coming from. Immelt’s largest acquisition was Alstom Power so there was some rumor that the energy unit could make its way to the corner office but it was not to be, the head of GE Healthcare will take the reigns. I can only imagine that GE saw a changing energy sector to a distributed grid at the same time GE Current wasn’t necessarily a huge success.
Research carries some weight. Research dollars often get a black eye when it comes to government spending. But with Trump’s new budget proposal (which isn’t going anywhere), big name CEOs have come out to protect the research money. I am most surprised by the US Chamber being on the list though the signatories are quite eclectic.
Regulators Rule The Day. When it comes to making an impact, we should focus on congressional seats first. The reason is because State Reps want to become members of Congress. You control a portion of that vote and you can control an issue. On the other hand, members of the regulatory body have an outsized ability to shape a State’s leadership or lack thereof when it comes to clean energy growth. The Northeast has quite the regulatory conferencing going on right now between NECPUC and the EEI conference. But more on EEI tomorrow perhaps.
News
Opinions:
Have a great day!
Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for June 12th, 2017
Presented by T-Top Buddy, a perfect gift for Father’s Day
Two weeks into the energy storage road show and we are learning a lot of things. I’d like to thank the many people that met with us and shared your experiences. There are big things happening in energy storage for sure, but things are still nuanced. More to come as we head to the Bay Area next week.
Market Segmentation Is In Focus. With the bankruptcy filing from American Solar Direct, you have to wonder where the market focus is going to be now. Growth is slowing, yes, but residential solar will continue forward. From my perspective, as a solar strategist, I would take a single market segment and make that profitable. It goes against most executive’s grain to have a single revenue stream but lack of focus lacks profits.
Judging Solar On Jobs, Alone. The trap is being set, I can see it coming. If the solar industry is only successful by growing the total number of jobs, then eventually we will have a year of decline. We do have hyper growth right now and 2016 was the ITC sunset year. Solar isn’t successful because we have the jobs, that’s only part of the story. Solar is good for consumers and ratepayers as well. Fixing the cost of energy for decades benefits businesses that don’t like the unkown of operating expenses and ratepayers on fixed income. If you budget $100 for electricity, wouldn’t it be nice to know that you can get the same amount for your money next year than you do right now?
The Solar Eclipse Debate. A few years ago there was a debate about how Germany would handle a solar eclipse while solar production was in peak output. California has enough solar to have a similar impact, a side effect of success I guess. The point is that a grid with the right pricing signals can manage energy needs, capacity forecasts and regulate frequency in any condition.
News
Opinions:
Have a great day!
Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for June 9th, 2017
Growth of Community Solar. There is a lot of value from a development standpoint for community solar. First it separates offtaker from the solar farm location. The geographical separation enables the second value generated by community solar, credit risk mitigation. If an offtaker defaults, moves or otherwise decides to stop paying, the solar farm can put in a new offtaker. Additionally, you can make a play to shorten the offtaker contracts or even go month to month like a cable bill. You lose the distributed network value but solar doesn’t really benefit from that anyways in most cases. If you can get your investors around the regulatory pricing risk, then we should continue to see a growth in this market.
Q1 US Solar Market. Always interesting to see the headlines from one publication to another even though they all got the same data the day before. 2017 will be smaller than 2016 and Q1 was smaller than Q4, no real surprises here. Cost of solar continues to drop in price and we will see how that impacts the future of the market, even in the circumstance of a minimum price situation.
Last night I came back from Los Angeles and will be in San Francisco the week of the 19th to talk more energy storage in a solar market. Looking forward to hearing from many of you.
Is Perry Going Rogue? The comments from nomination hearings to the current comments, Rick Perry seems to be continuously leaving the door open for training for job replacements from coal to renewables. I don’t think it means much nor do I read too much into it except perhaps placating the critics enough to keep doing what he really wants, prolonging the market for incumbent entities.
News
Opinions:
Have a great day!
Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for June 8th, 2017
Terraform goes to Brookfield. The courts have cleared the way for Terraform to become owned by Brookfield. In one transaction, Brookfield grows its renewables portfolio in a large way even though it has owned hydro projects for decades.
The SMART program. In Mass, SREC 2 is coming to a close and the SMART program will start being implemented. There are still a few steps in the rulemaking but it looks positive for the next iteration of one of the most lucrative solar markets. The NEM cap needs to be raised and customers need to be reeducated about the expectations but SMART should create a 1.6GW opportunity for the solar market.
NC Solar Reform. The bill is news to me but based on the headline, and what I expect from a NC legislature, the reforms should reduce expectations for the market going forward. Interconnections have slowed down dramatically and a broader PURPA conversation is happening. Let’s see how this bill goes through the process and what happens if it passes.
News
Opinions:
Have a great day!
Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for June 7th, 2017
I am finding myself in Los Angeles on the day that Strasburg and Kershaw face each other in a daytime matchup between the Dodgers and Nationals. I know that there must be someone with nice corporate tickets to the Dodgers and cant find anyone to give them to. Sooooo, let me be helpful and take a few off your hands, or join me and we can talk solar while watching a few hall of famers pitch against each other.
Which way would the panels face? Trump pitched the idea of having solar panels on the Mexico wall. This raises a lot of questions for me about which way the panels would face and where the energy would go. You could envision a microgrid wall that takes the energy and powers the technologically advanced wall itself or provide energy to communities near the wall. I’d be interested to see how this would work.
Oh, the games we play. One of the takeaways from many conversations in California about storage is the ‘rate window’ discussion. Everyone knows the windows are changing but no one knows what they are changing to. That is not by accident I think, as IOUs hope to create a market freeze on the solar front before releasing the new time schedules at which point storage and solar will be easily paired together.
Solar Sin City. In one of the most dramatic turn arounds from a policy front, Nevada will go from killing solar to passing a slew of solar friendly bills. As I had reported last month, the timing looked right and now you have net metering coming back, an RPS passing legislature and community solar looking to make an entrance. That is a big swing from a State that had to lay off thousands of solar employees that hopefully will find their way back into the market.
News
Opinions:
Have a great day!
Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for June 6th, 2017
Crazy long day of travel and meetings as I continue the road through California. Thank you to many of you for helping point me in the right direction and recommendations on who to talk to about energy storage. No commentary today. More tomorrow.
News
Opinions:
Have a great day!
Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for June 5th, 2017
I am on my way to Los Angeles to continue the Energy Storage road show, which means I will learn how badly the Elon Musk tunnels are needed as I sit in traffic.
News
Opinions:
Have a great day!
Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for June 2nd, 2017
I don’t feel like talking about it. It took some effort but I wanted to leave out one of the dozens of articles about Trump leaving the Paris agreement. Does it matter? What does it mean? All of that is just content because it doesn’t take more than a sentence to say that it was a ridiculous decision to leave the accord. I haven’t spoken to a reasonable person that thinks otherwise. Onward people, go get stuff done and we will continue to jump over every hurdle thrown at the industry. Nobody is going to do it for us so don’t put your hopes in anyone.
Enjoy your weekend, I will speak to you again on Monday from beautiful Los Angeles. I will be in San Francisco the week of June 19th.
News
Opinions:
Have a great day!
Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for June 1st, 2017
As goes Paris, so goes Elon. Unless this is some covfefe, Trump is planning on leaving the Paris agreement. This shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone but it is telling us all that we should have no hopes for Jared and Ivanka moderating the President on climate change. Elon has said that he would leave the President’s council if Trump leaves the Paris agreement.
Solar’s Playbook. I like the headline, consolidating efforts to push our agenda but let’s see how it plays out. I think we are still some ways away from having a single intervenor in State cases on behalf of the industry associations.
Are you caught up on the EnergyWakeup podcast? More great episodes coming soon.
Grid modernization. The good folks at NCETC are now publishing a quarterly report on grid infrastructure investments. As grid operators realize the future is upon them, this will be a good indicator for where RE penetration can continue and energy storage takes some market share. Well done by the team in NC.
News
Opinions:
Have a great day!
Yann