SolarWakeup Live! San Francisco. The Bay Area is the center of the solar industry universe. Almost 20% of the readers of this newsletter are somewhere within an hour of San Francisco. So after a 3 city warmup, we are coming there. We are honing in on a venue and invite you to join us. One confirmed speaker is Danny Kennedy of CalCEF and formerly Sungevity and so much more. If you are looking for brand exposure on this platform, this is also a great opportunity to sponsor. As you’ve seen below, sponsors get on the newsletter, website, podcast in addition to the event. Send me an email at yann@solarwakeup.com to talk about sponsoring. See you there!
I Am Hopeful. David Hogg is one of the recognizable activists that has emerged post Parkland shooting. Through his activism he has amassed a platform and a following on social media. One of his comments last week was about the need for STEM education so that he and his generation can get jobs in wind and solar. It took me a few days to digest this and consider whether it was content important for this audience. Here is a 17 year old that just went through horror. He is speaking out on issues that matter to him and sees optimism in the future within our industry. I think that says something about the industry that we’ve built together and I, for one, welcome him and all of the next generation to join us in our mission.
You Get An EV. You Get An EV. No, this is no the next episode of the Oprah show. But it is likely coming to a utility near you. We’ve talked about it before. Utilities have flat demand growth and they need a catalyst and that means competing with gas stations as the source of fuel. This is not a small event in history, utilities have never competed with BP, Exxon, etc. They have each stayed in their own lane but now those worlds are converging.
Everyone Loves Tax Credits. GM wants to build more EVs. Every auto OEM is doing so and just in time for the EV tax credit to expire. Look for these giant companies, with rather large amounts of influence to head to DC and get the tax credit extended. Expect the utilities to help them do that, because of the point above. Wall Street may be on their side as well because someone has to finance all of those cars.
- SolarWakeup: And The Next Generation Will Lead Us
- Quartz: Utilities are paying their customers to buy electric vehicles
- Reuters: GM plans to expand Bolt EV output, asks Congress to help
- Utility Dive: Community energy storage – What is it? where is it? how does it work?
- SolarWakeup: GE Latest Corporate To Go Big On Energy Storage
- EDF: Compensating distributed energy resources for environmental attributes
- Renewable Energy World: Wind and Solar Industries Weigh in on Proposed Steel Tariffs
- WRAL: $600M Duke Energy request just the beginning in ongoing rate case
Opinion
Have a great day!
Yann