This is your SolarWakeup for May 2nd, 2024
Opinion
News
1 Utility Dive:
AEP faces 15 GW of new load, driven by Amazon, Google, other data centers - interim CEO Fowke
2 Energy Storage News:
G7 nations set 1500GW global energy storage target for 2030
3 Bloomberg:
Sunnova Energy Huddles With Adviser on Balance Sheet Options
4 Axios:
PG&E seeks KKR deal to help fund California wildfire prevention
5 Reuters:
Microsoft, Brookfield to partner on renewable energy projects
6 Solar Bilder:
The eclipse’s path of totality as seen in solar PV monitoring data
7 PV-Tech:
Matrix Renewables, Hyundai sign 147MW solar PPA in Texas
8 Renewable Energy News:
New Jersey seeks fourth round of offshore wind farm proposals as foes push back
Opinions:
9 PV-Magazine:
Virginia General Assembly passes pro-solar legislation
Have a great day!
Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for May 1st, 2024
Opinion
News
1 Bloomberg:
PG&E in Talks with KKR to Sell Minority Stake in Power Unit
2 Axios:
Department of Energy dives into promises and perils of AI
3 PV-Magazine:
CATL presents EV battery with 1,000 km range
4 New York Times:
Hydrogen Offers Germany a Chance to Take a Lead in Green Energy
5 Reuters:
China, US to hold climate meetings in Washington in May
6 PV-Tech:
Philippines to add 2GW of installed solar capacity in 2024
7 Renewable Energy World:
Minnesota saw 54% zero-carbon power in 2023, hitting clean energy milestones
8 Energy Storage News:
Natron Energy starts manufacturing ‘50,000+ cycle-life’ sodium-ion batteries at Michigan factory
Opinions:
9 Utility Dive:
Solar tariffs are in the spotlight again. Our current approach isn’t the answer.
Have a great day!
Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for April 30th, 2024
Tax Equity Transfers. Tax equity transfers are a game changer for monetization of the valuable tax credits but there’s a minor wrinkle. Typically when tax equity was in play, it was either funded at NTP or bridged by the construction loan since the takeout financing was in place. With credits, takeout funding is a bit more flexible and nuanced. So here’s the question to the SolarWakeup think tank, who’s doing the best structure and funding tax equity bridges from NTP to commercial operation for the tax credits? If you are, send those names this way so I can help connect both sides of the table.
News
1 Wall Street Journal:
How Big Data Centers Are Slowing the Shift to Clean Energy
2 Utility Dive:
BlackRock, Temasek decarbonization venture raises $1.4B
3 BLoomberg:
Europe’s Power Prices Swing Wildly as Wind Supply Retreats
4 Reuters:
Insight - As solar capacity grows, some of America's most productive farmland is at risk
5 PV-Tech:
Sunpower to cut 1,000 jobs, admits misstatements in financial results for 2022
6 Renewable Energy World:
DOE announces AI initiatives enabling cleaner power grid
7 Energy Storage News:
California - ‘Energy storage revolution is here,’ says governor as US leader state surpasses 10GW
8 PV-Magazine:
Hitachi Energy to invest more than $100 million to manufacture transformers in Canada
Opinions:
9 Heatmap:
Can Biden Ditch Coal Without Killing Coal Country?
Have a great day!
Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for April 29th, 2024
Ready For Battery Primetime? We’re still in April and ERCOT is already putting peak notices into effect and California warns of blackouts. How well is your battery performing and what are you most concerned about? I’d love to hear from you and understand what you look at in the morning when running your battery.
Tracker Bonanza. Nextracker opened additional manufacturing line in Pittsburgh, Array Technologies hosted the Secretary of Energy at their factory opening in New Mexico and Nevados expanded capacity in Texas. There’s a drive for new capacity in the tracker market and it’s right here in the USA thanks to the IRA.
News
1 Bloomberg:
Texas Grid Issues Notice Ahead of Potential Emergency Next Week
2 Utility Dive:
MISO capacity prices triple for next summer, spring, partly on power plant retirements
3 Axios:
AI advances may frustrate U.S. climate goals as electric demand surges
4 Renewable Energy World:
Nextracker adding 4 GW of capacity with U.S. steel facility expansion
5 Solar Power World:
Array Technologies breaks ground on second tracker manufacturing site in Albuquerque
6 PV-Tech:
DNV - China to more than quintuple renewable energy installations by 2050, with solar capacity to reach 5.5TW
7 Energy Storage News:
US takes ‘significant step forward’ to speed up electricity transmission project permitting
8 Canary Media:
Chart - Heavy industry is the next big climate problem to tackle
9 PV-Magazine:
Minnesota sues GoodLeap, Sunlight, Mosaic and Dividend over dealer fees
Opinions:
10 Los Angeles Times:
California battery storage increasing rapidly, but not enough to end blackouts, Gov. Newsom says
Have a great day!
Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for April 26th, 2024
Opinion
News
1 New York Times:
Key Solar Panel Ingredient Is Made in the U.S.A. Again
2 Axios:
EPA moves to curb power plant CO2 in landmark move
3 Utility Dive:
DOE sets 2-year deadline for federal transmission permitting, cutting average timelines in half
4 PV-Magazine:
IRS issues final guidance for clean energy tax credit transferability
5 Bloomberg:
Why the World Needs More Copper — a Lot More Copper
6 Reuters:
California set for solar, storage surge in zonal grid plan
7 Renewable Energy World:
LevelTen Energy launches clean energy tax credit marketplace
Opinions:
8 Energy Storage News:
Energy storage market grew faster than ever in 2023, BESS was most invested-in energy tech, according to BNEF, IEA
Have a great day!
Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for April 25th, 2024
Trade Saga. We’ve been here before, another anti-dumping trade case has been filed. This time highlighting subsidies and unfair pricing from product with the origin of Cambodia, Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam. There was some thoughts that India could be included but it was not. We now embark on a 6 month process with a check-in in July for a preliminary determination. The filing has the name of some US based manufacturers that filed the case, namely First Solar and Q-Cells. Given the IRA benefits for domestic manufacturing, I wonder what the impact of local subsidies could imply to the case though I don’t expect much. I’ll refrain from my thoughts on this overall saga that has plagued this industry for a decade plus but wouldn’t it be great to be able to buy solar panels at the sub 10cents per watt that other markets get to?
News
1 Reuters:
US solar panel makers seek import tariffs to protect new domestic factories
2 New York Times:
Blinken Goes to China With Potential Trouble on Horizon
3 Renewable Energy World:
Solar industry reacts to new tariff petitions targeting Southeast Asian countries
4 Utility Dive:
ERCOT launches new planning efforts as 2030 load growth projections soar 40 GW in a year
5 Bloomberg:
French Grid Issues Are Causing Power Prices to Soar in Europe
6 Axios:
Extreme weather is making power outages trend higher
7 Solar Power World:
SunPower to cut nearly 25% of workforce, including direct residential sales
8 Energy Storage News:
LG Energy Solution fires warning shot to patent infringers as battery industry prepares for wave of lawsuits
9 PV-Magazine:
Enphase delivers revenue miss amid softened residential solar demand
10 Heatmap:
Biden’s Climate Cash Is Finally Pouring In
Opinions:
11 Canary Media:
How the Biden admin is trying to boost renewables on public land
Have a great day!
Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for April 24th, 2024
Houston. Good morning from 37,000 feet as I head to Houston for the Voltility Energy Storage Summit. This is becoming one of my favorite events because it is centered around networking and not pay for play advertisements on the handful of panels. While I love going to many events and understand the incredible cost to put them on, having done that with SolarWakeup Live! I love being in person with other leaders building out this market. Should we bring back the SolarWakeup Live! event?
News
1 Bloomberg:
SunPower Slides After Disclosing Plans to Restate Earnings
2 Reuters:
Enphase forecasts revenue below estimates as inverter market stays under pressure
3 Politico:
Solar drives renewables milestone in California
4 Utility Dive:
GM Energy rolls out its first vehicle-to-home EV charging products
5 Axios:
First Look - Spotlight on climate migration
6 PV-Tech:
Highland Materials secures US$255.6 million 48C tax credit to build polysilicon plant in the US
7 Renewable Energy World:
Q1 EV sales match all of 2020 as demand surges amid investment - IEA
8 Energy Storage News:
Croatia allocating €500 million for BESS – report
9 Canary Media:
Tritium, major supplier of EV fast-charging equipment, is insolvent
10 PV-Magazine:
Congress urged to reform clean energy bottlenecks before 2024 election
Opinions:
11 Heatmap News:
Are Pollsters Getting Climate Change Wrong?
Have a great day!
Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for April 23rd, 2024
Negative Price Signals. I always have a hard time with bad headlines. While the Washington Post article doesn’t say anything novel, the headline implies that solar is such terrible energy that it gets thrown away. What it doesn’t say is two important things. First is that cheap solar energy has lowered the cost of energy for all of California in a way that nobody every predicted with a plethora of low cost PPAs that have no commodity price adjustment for fuel. Second, is that a negative price, is a price signal for investments that leverage arbitrage, like batteries. Energy storage arbitrage will enable more solar to be built than the 47GW that already has been built and ultimately create a base case for solar making up for most of the generation on the CAISO grid. That being said, there’s control complications that need to be taken into account and keeping those batteries flexible won’t be easy. This article is the exact reason why I love chairing the energy storage division for SEIA, because the combo of solar with batteries is exactly what we need in this energy transition.
Resilient Puerto Rico. Some humble brags for my team at FlexGen for signing on to a great project in Puerto Rico with Arclight Capital’s Infinigen. We all know how unreliable the Puerto Rico grid has been after many storms have harmed the infrastructure. This is an important step for more resilience that I’m proud to be a part of on Earth Day.
News
1 Washington Post:
Rooftop solar panels are flooding California’s grid. That’s a problem.
2 Energy Storage News:
FlexGen to deploy 15MW BESS in Puerto Rico for Arclight and Infinigen
3 PV-Magazine:
Earth Day celebrated with $7 billion solar funding announcement
4 PV-Tech:
Maxeon sues Hanwha QCells over alleged US TOPCon cell patent infringement
5 Canary Media:
Data centers want clean electricity. Can Georgia Power deliver it?
6 GreenBiz:
Salesforce to lobby for new rules on AI’s environmental impact
7 Axios:
Exclusive - New Democratic transmission legislation
8 Renewable Energy World:
U.S. hydropower generation expected to increase by 6% in 2024
Opinions:
9 Utility Dive:
Solar PPA prices stable for now but expected to rise absent interest rate cut - LevelTen
Have a great day!
Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for April 22nd, 2024
Opinion
News
1 PV-Tech:
Maxeon sues REC Solar over US TOPCon cell patent infringement
2 PV-Magazine:
Mercom, WoodMac note challenging PV investment climate in Q1
3 Utility Dive:
NYISO launches first-in-nation DER integration program in move toward FERC Order 2222 compliance
4 Bloomberg:
America’s Clean Tech Withers Even as Imports Are Blocked
5 Axios:
Many voters unfamiliar with Biden climate law, despite economic benefits - polling
6 Reuters:
FERC to unveil US power grid reform on May 13
7 Heatmap:
A Big Week for Batteries
8 Canary Media:
Chart - The US clean energy backlog is getting bigger and bigger
Opinions:
9 New York Times:
A Planetary Crisis Awaits the Next President
Have a great day!
Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for April 19th, 2024
Opinion
News
1 Bloomberg:
Solar Groups Lobby Biden to Head Off Sector-Roiling Trade Case
2 Reuters:
Higher interest rates pose risk to renewable sector, hurting energy transition, say analysts
3 Utility Dive:
DOE cites cost, reliability concerns for new gas plants as it details how to meet surging power demand
4 PV-Tech:
Italy’s solar renaissance - the challenges, the opportunities and the grid
5 Solar Power World:
New York includes renewable energy project permitting act in state budget
6 Energy Storage News:
Britishvolt ESS gigafactory plan dead after Blackstone buys site for data centre
7 PV-Magazine:
Allow solar developers to choose “connect and manage,” says DOE roadmap
Opinions:
8 Heatmap News:
Is AI Really About to Devour All Our Energy?
Have a great day!
Yann
