Tag Archives: Daily Rundown

This is your SolarWakeup for May 23rd, 2018

Strand My Assets, Not My Money. RMI is out with a report that outlines the long term investment thesis for new natural gas plants. Hint: it’s not good. The report finds that like many coal plants today, gas plants don’t provide the best financial return in the future and could find themselves pushed aside for financial reasons. This isn’t just a problem for private investors, consumers that finance these plants, guarantee their financial return, are the quasi investors within regulated monopoly areas. If this sounds familiar just look at the nuclear bailouts and requested coal bailouts in the news today.

Show Me The Wires. SEIA’s report on grid modernization makes the point that RMI found above. The future of energy will value the grid of the future. This means that more distributed generation will require a grid with less wires. Anything that ends up pushing energy from a central power plant to the loads will have a value that is significantly diminished. That future may be okay for solar and wind farms that have no exposure to fuel costs and volatility but it becomes harder for more traditional fuel. Distributed generation needs to be a central part of everything we do as a solar industry and that benefits even those that are not focused on DG.

Talk To Michael. There is a statement that comes up in some conversations with politicians. It doesn’t have to be said often because lobbyists get the process for political leaders very quickly. After a pitch on an issue with some politicians, emphasis on some, the elected will say something like, “that’s very interesting, I’d like to learn more, please talk to XYZ.” In Trump’s universe, it may have been “Talk to Michael.” At the very least, this is what one nuclear power plant was thinking and maybe solar should have been told to TTM. Of course I kid, mostly, I think.

Long Term Vision, Short Term Problems. 3 months go by very quickly and changing the energy market in 3 months increments is basically impossible. If access to capital is required in order to make that change work, then having to focus on the quarterly earnings makes that difficult. So how do we merge the desire for transparency in public companies with the hope to allow companies to change the norms.

Windy City, Sunny Market. Get your ticket for SolarWakeup Live! Chicago. Part of the event will be personal matchmaking between those that have projects or pipeline with those that have capital. The one day event you will not want to miss. solarwakeuplive.com

Opinion

Have a great day!

Yann

This is your SolarWakeup for May 22nd, 2018

Q2 Sentiment Survey. The second quarter sentiment survey is up and running. Please take 30 seconds and answer these 5 questions and tell us how you feel. This is a survey for individuals so it doesn’t matter what role you play in solar. We will release the results at SolarWakeup Live! Chicago on June 21st, you should have your ticket already!

IOUs Getting Bigger. NextEra, the parent company of Florida Power & Light, is buying the Florida subsidiary of Southern Company, Gulf Power. Moreover it is acquiring several power plants that serve other Florida entities like Orlando and FMPA, which previously signed a solar PPA with NextEra.

Innovating The Midwest Energy. AEE is out with a memo to the gubernatorial candidates in Ohio. It outlines 5 points to consider in growing the advanced energy economy in Ohio, which just a few years ago had the potential of becoming a major solar market. It has solar success in the Youngstown area with the manufacturing base of First Solar and its series 6 rollout.

CA Solar Homes, Explained. When CA put in place a solar mandate on all new homes, the details are more nuanced than solar on every home in the State. I wasn’t planning on breaking it down, mostly because reading regulatory documents doesn’t fit into my calendar but I bring you the wonderful reporting from Julia Pyper. The details are detailed and I assure you, don’t start reading the breakdown without sufficient time. I never said it would be short!

Electrify Everything. Keyless entry. Air conditioned seats (I live in Florida). Regenerative braking. Adaptive cruise control. These are some of the features I want in my cars. They simply make the car a better driving experience and make our roads safer. Some of these features are part of why electric vehicles make for better modes of transportation and why the transition will speed up. When a city buys a new fleet of buses, why would they buy ICE? I don’t see it lasting much longer before all new fleet purchases are electric.

Helping AHJs. I wish that there was a way to speak to all AHJs overseeing solar at the same time. First, I’d like to make sure they are paying attention to the small details that make sure solar is installed properly without causing roof leaks or affecting the roof in a bad way. In the meantime we have IREC continuing the important work of teaching solar to AHJs.

Opinion

Have a great day!

Yann

This is your SolarWakeup for May 21st, 2018

Q2 Sentiment Survey. The second quarter sentiment survey is up and running. Please take 30 seconds and answer these 5 questions and tell us how you feel. This is a survey for individuals so it doesn’t matter what role you play in solar. We will release the results at SolarWakeup Live! Chicago on June 21st, you should have your ticket already!

Residential Advisory Council. Last call for residential installers to join the SolarWakeup residential solar market advisory council. We’ve got a couple of dozen involved already and will be engaging this group to learn more about the most important segment of the solar industry. If you’re interested in being involved, which will be worth your time and insights, please send me an email.

The List Of 201 Impacts. Last week we changed the format of our original reporting. Our hopes is to shift into a format that is less about telling you how we feel about the news, which I will continue to do in this portion, but give you greater detail about the news that matter to the industry. In this report we went deeper into the impact of 201 for Cypress Creek, which gave us more detail about their project cancellations. We knew that any 201 tariff would result in job losses, and the most important job losses are the jobs not created. If you live in one of these 11 States, contact your Senator and tell him about the lost opportunity.

Not A Spectator Sport. Michigan is not the biggest solar market but it can be. As an aside, Michigan was on track to be the hub of solar manufacturing in the US thanks to the leadership of Governor Granholm. After a great attempt by Vote Solar and others to stop a natural gas plant in favor of more renewables, Tom Steyer also pushed a separate RPS initiative in the State. DTE announced late on Friday that they are increasing and pushing up their RPS goal to 50% by 2030, with a personal note to Steyer in the press release. While a victory, I wonder who may not have wanted the RPS ballot question on the ballot during a gubernatorial election?

Corporate Energy Executives. I like the idea of energy executives within corporations getting some spotlight in the boardroom. You already see this within big tech companies but how about the rest of the top corporations? When 70% of customers (according to Deloitte) want to know companies are doing more renewable energy, you’ve got to think that the CEO is looking around the room and wondering what the plan is. How do we elevate these executives? Anyone here do this for a living and want to explain the internal work you do to get projects done to the audience at SolarWakeup Live! Chicago? I would love to have you.

I Want This. In case you missed it, Meghan and Harry left for the post-nuptial celebration in an awesome 1968 Jaguar. The best part? It was converted to electric. Here its he official Kensington Palace video.

Opinion

Have a great day!

Yann

This is your SolarWakeup for May 18th, 2018

A lot is happening in solar and things are coming together after a tough year. Markets like Florida and Illinois are poised to be major going forward and we have to fight to maintain the traction we had in CT and MA. Change is hard for many, we’ll highlight some of that in today’s Wakeup. Remember, if there are stories that need to be covered in your neighborhood, send them this way. Together we make solar stronger. Have a great weekend!

Learn About Illinois. Don’t forget to mark your calendars and book your trip to Chicago. On June 21st the leaders behind the energy policy in this hot market will be giving the insight. If you are an investor looking to make your splash here, we have some great sponsorship opportunities that match you with developers in the market. You can register at solarwakeuplive.com

Corporate Solar America. Frank covers the reports from Deloitte on the attitude coming out of corporate board rooms. With the polled corporations saying that 70% of their customers expect them to drive action on the clean tech issues. That’s why I get excited when a corporate sustainability professional subscribes to SolarWakeup, it shows a level of dedication to solar.

2 Years Of SEIA, 20 Years of SEIA PAC. Let’s put one state’s utility lobbying spend in perspective. In Florida, the investor owned utilities spent $43 million in the past two election cycles. That is an understated amount considering the money that went to lobbyists, internal and external, plus the PR firms to shape the messaging. In comparison, SEIA would have funded more than years of operations and likely over a decade in SEIA PAC spending based on historical numbers. We will never outspend the incumbent market participants but we will outlive and outvote them. Half of the Florida spending went to a ballot initiative that failed due to the grassroots support for the solar industry.

Well Regulated Monopoly. John Grisham is going to move to South Carolina and write a thriller about backroom deals the utility. The plot will include a $9billion blunder and an attempt to hide the information from regulators who oversee the utility in return for double digit returns and a monopoly. Seriously though, how in the world can a regulator do the best for consumers if the corporation it is supposed to oversee refuses to comply with the oversight.

Thou Shall Not? Arizona solar numbers are on the uptick and large scale solar plus storage are coming online at amazing numbers. With the new APS RFP, it seems like APS may be stepping back in time against the sentiments of the corporation commission.

Opinion

Have a great day!

Yann