This is your SolarWakeup for November 22nd, 2016
SCTY is delisted. It is official, SolarCity shareholders are now owners of Tesla shares. The stock has stopped trading and will be delisted as the merger is complete. Congratulations to all involved that overcame what seemed like long odds throughout the process. The official document here.
Solar communities. Community solar is clearly on the rise, but still some ways away from residential solar. NREL is out with a report outlining that community solar now works in a vast majority of States. Community solar has advantages, being able to overcome contract length and credit issues and at the same time giving flexibility for people that sell their home or are renters.
Downward module pressure. Canadian Solar is the latest solar company to announce its issues with pricing expectations over the next year. While large, the market is also softening in some areas and is also well supplied by module manufacturing capacity. Canadian is no stranger to getting into other channels like development. Expect all module manufacturers to look for ways to get into the US market even with the pressures.
The Enel Yieldco. It is known but not often advertised the Enel has a drop-down vehicle with GE. Now GE is acquiring the 1% of the JV that will make it a 50/50 venture which already holds 1.2GW of various power assets, namely solar, wind, and hydro. No other financial terms were released.
NC market woes. Duke Energy, which controls the vast majority of the State’s energy supply, wants some changes to the rules. These requests have been made in the past but this time they are in the shadows of the longest list of interconnection requests the company has ever had. Rules for those interconnection requests also appear to be changing on the fly. A large player in the State, FLS which was recently acquired by Cypress Creek, is currently suing a Montana Utility through FERC for changing PURPA rules. Watch this trend.
News
Opinions:
Have a great day!
Yann
The Merger Is Complete, Tesla Owns SolarCity
The deal is done. Tesla has officially acquired SolarCity. After months of speculation, Wall Street questions and doubts that this day would come, it is done. SolarCity will stop trading and the ticker symbol SCTY is gone, delisted from the exchange. No more information about the integration has been released except for the $150 million efficiencies that would be created by combining the companies. So expect some job cuts and introduction of the solar system sales to the hundreds of Tesla stores around the Country. Consumers will be able to get their solar, stationary storage and moving storage (the car) … Read More
This is your SolarWakeup for November 21st, 2016
Tesla’s roofing dreams. We all saw the presentation about Tesla’s solar shingles and the solar industry answered with great skepticism. The roofing industry doesn’t seem too eager to weigh in quite yet. DOW recently pulled the plug on its solar shingle probably writing down a good amount of investment. Musk makes a new goal public; the solar tile will be cheaper than a non-solar roof even without the energy production. Unless he is comparing to French slate material, he is clearly mistaken because it is doubtful that there is a technical potential for solar to be cheaper than asphalt shingles.
Taking the Terraforms. Brookfield and Appaloosa have upped their pressure to take over Terraform Power and potentially Terraform Global. They proposed to acquire the shares at $13/share which is near their current value. If TERP enters into the agreement before December 6th, they yieldco will not have to make another creditor payment.
FERC goes for storage. A new proposed rulemaking process was started by FERC that focuses on storage and demand response. Public comment is now open but the goal is to allow storage to participate in wholesale energy markets. Another market for storage is positive, now is time to create more wholesale markets.
Illinois goes Christmas shopping. Apparently, legislators call 500 page bills a Christmas list because there is something for everyone. One legislator called this bill a $24billion rate hike because it goes to save the nuclear power plants similar to New York. The solar industry is united behind the opposition for this bill because of the indiscriminate demand charges placed on solar customer’s bills.
News
Opinions:
Have a great day!
Yann
These are the top 10 most read solar articles by your peers this week!
News
The Top 10 is ranked by the number of SolarWakeup.com readers that clicked on the news article during the previous week. It is the poll of the most relevant solar news of the week as judged by your colleagues and competitors.
Have a great day!
Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for November 18th, 2016
TeslaCity Is Here. To the tune of 85%, shareholders voted to overwhelmingly to let Tesla buy SolarCity. We will await further details on how the integration and timing around the final acquisition will take place. Solar roof shingles are apparently coming summer of 2017, I will make some calls to the roofing industry to see how they feel about that.
Kerry goes to COP22. Outgoing Secretary of State Kerry is in Morocco speaking at COP22. A mission that was probably planned to be different ended in a message by Kerry. Move slowly and with eyes wide open before dismantling the work this administration has accomplished. The US is now committing to reducing CO2 emissions by 80% by 2050, and I can guarantee that in 2050 we will look back in horror that we had not done more in 2016.
Future of Solar. Yesterday we published a list of 7 people that Trump should consider for Secretary of Energy. Today, Richard Matsui from kWh Analytics warns the industry that solar should be wary. Yes, it is 2016 not 2012, but there are tightening margins and constricting global markets. Cutting costs is key to your business in solar.
Nevada continues. A small and underreported (surprisingly not pitched by both sides) PUC hearing is happening in NV. Net metering is being debated by the commission NV Energy and stakeholders for a small section of the State.
Amazon goes solar baseload power. AWS is doubling (quintupling actually) down on solar for its data centers. EDF is making another great case today that we need to think beyond baseload power because you know, it’s the 21st century and we have data. Think about it, don’t you think that AWS knows exactly how much power they want/need/produce on a minute by minute basis?
News
Opinions:
Have a great day!
Yann
Solar’s Future May Not Be Pre-Ordained
For virtually everyone who cares about climate change, the election of Donald Trump precipitates an unprecedented crisis. The Paris climate agreement, an extraordinary commitment to global cooperation by more than 200 countries to dramatically curb carbon emissions, is now in grave danger. The Clean Power Plan is almost certainly dead. Our domestic politics are failing us, the world, and future generations yet unborn. There has been much commentary in the last week that despite the shift in political winds, that solar remains a bright spot (see: “Trump Can’t Stop the Energy Revolution” and “Trump Can’t Stop The Clean Economy”). … Read More
This is your SolarWakeup for November 17th, 2016
Next Secretary of Energy? We’ve got your list. The list of people that President-Elect Trump should consider for DOE. This isn’t a political assessment it is an assessment for the type of person that can be successful within the administration and inspire private sector innovation. Let’s remember, the energy sector is an enormous wealth creation market with a trillion dollar opportunity. Follow the money, open the markets and the private sector will thrive on economics and value to the consumer.
Distributed rate design. NARUC finalized its DER guide for rate design at their annual meeting. Both SEIA and Vote Solar came out with positive outlook for the report which amongst other things outlines that 19 States have published reports saying that there does not appear to be a cost shift for distributed solar.
Series 6 focus. First Solar formally announced that it was scrapping Series 4 manufacturing expansion and planned Series 5 roll out in favor of going straight to Series 6. The reason is simple, it brings First Solar’s modules in line or ahead of crystalline in terms of efficiency. The company is going to reduce its workforce by 27% (1,600 people) and write down between $500-$700million. I don’t see this as bad news, this is a focus on cost reduction and creating margins on a value proposition. More solar companies should focus on that, especially the $150million in profits last quarter.
Let the market work. You are going to hear a lot about letting markets work from this outlet. When we talk about demand charges, solar fees, or rate design, remember that if the market has the right pricing signals then the consumer will be able to figure out what they need, when they need it and how much they are willing to pay. Illinois is doing it wrong in my opinion, no need for indiscriminate demand charges and handouts for power plants. Fix the valuation for the power market instead.
Larger grids = greater value. EDF makes a point that needs to be talked about more. The electric grid needs to start connecting to neighboring systems. PJM which goes from Illinois to North Carolina and New Jersey which allows for all sorts of fuels to compete in a regulated competitive market.
News
Opinions:
Have a great day!
Yann
7 People President-Elect Trump Should Consider For Secretary of Energy
With Steven Chu and Ernest Moniz as Secretaries, the Department of Energy (DOE) under Obama has done much good work to support advanced energy: the creation of the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E), major investment in smart grid under the stimulus package, the SunShot initiative, new appliance and fuel efficiency standards, a loan guarantee program that has supported solar, wind, biofuels, nuclear, battery storage, and advanced vehicles, and more. Though the Obama Administration exhibited a favoritism towards renewable technologies, it still embraced an “all-of-the-above” energy strategy. In fact, EIA data shows that natural gas production is up over 25% and … Read More
News Roundtable: Presidential Election 2016 and What Will Trump Do? (Podcast)
The marathon Presidential election is over and Donald Trump is the next President. Join the podcast as Yann Brandt and Frank Andorka try to make some sense of what the election means to solar and how the industry did on the State level votes. Coverage includes what Trump’s moves could be on energy and votes in Arizona, Nevada and Florida. This is part 2 of 2.
This is your SolarWakeup for November 16th, 2016
Make sure you visit back later in the day, we have been hard at work for a week to write an important article. “7 people that President-Elect Trump should consider for Secretary of Energy” which we will be releasing sometime today.
More money, no problems. We have some news for you this morning about $500 million that went to a solar lender the morning after the Trump election. In all, almost a billion dollars went to developers and lenders this week in just two transactions. Let’s highlight the good news instead of just the trumped up pessimism we are currently surrounded by.
The constituency of 209k. A friend of SolarWakeup’s and the all around good guy got a nice write-up from The Hill yesterday. Scott Hennessey has been a solar lobbyist for a decade, starting as one of the first employees at SEIA before moving to SolarCity. Definitely worth the read.
Solar is good for all. A Boston University professor did some solar analysis in Massachusetts on an hour by hour basis. The results were interesting mostly in the wording. In the report, solar customers were found to provide value to non-solar customers while also benefitting from the infrastructure for those kWh that weren’t purchased. The balance is created using a simple but ‘wrong’ incentive structure.
Illinois shenanigans. This is a quick moving story because Illinois is in a special session, one apparently famous for pushing legislation through without much debate. The long story, in short, is that demand charges are in an SB amendment buried deep in a couple hundred pages. We will have more coverage on this but get ready to activate in Illinois, grassroots will make or break this.
Crane’s thoughts on Trump. David Crane, as an editor at large for GreenBiz, has some advice on giving Trump a chance. There are some caveats to that advice to set the expectations….not too high. The best advice in the column is a recognition that we are fortunate that this is 2016 and not 2012 because solar is in a much better place and leadership can come from the States.
News
Opinions:
Have a great day!
Yann