This is your SolarWakeup for November 7th, 2023
Solar And Storage Finance. If you’re in New York for the conference, let me know, I will be here for the event as well.
Getting IEs Up To Speed. Technical views on the entire tech stack of your solar and storage projects. Much is made of asset performance especially now that decade plus of historicals are in the books. For solar it’s all about the technical performance based on the measured sunlight at the site. With batteries the upside is much greater given that power markets can move with volatility while having to match the market opportunity with the asset’s availability. As the asset classes come together, independent engineers will learn more about the parts and pieces that make good projects good.
Managing Installer Cash Flow. Interest rates are the highest in 22 years, increasing solar financing costs and softening consumer demand for loan products. Businesses are feeling the pain of strained cash flows, labor costs and profitability pressures. Palmetto, a B2B technology company accelerating the adoption of clean energy, has announced a new partnership offering for solar installers to help stabilize cash flows and grow faster in today’s market. Built on top of Palmetto’s Clean Energy Operating Platform, this is a comprehensive suite of tools and services enabling installers to streamline operations, optimize performance, and increase profitability. Visit https://www.palmetto.com/finance or contact capital@palmetto.com for more.
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for November 6th, 2023
If Interest Rates Recover. You have to go back to a few months in 2000 and before that 1993 to find interest rates set by the Federal Reserve to be at today’s levels. You can have two views looking forward, rates will lower back to levels closer to those of the past 20 years or they’ll resemble the 70’s and 80’s, i.e. this is the new normal. From a residential solar perspective, rates are putting a big damper on loans and therefore growth rates while utility rates are rising, they’re not rising as quickly as the solar loan rates are competing with. So if you look at the stock levels of the residential solar companies, this could be a buying opportunity if your view is that things will get better if and when rates recover. Utility scale solar represents a different kind of opportunity for investors. PPA rates are rising partially from supply chain inflation but also cost of capital. Nobody wants to invest in a solar farm at 6% return when you can get that from putting cash into the bank at 5%. So PPA rates will increase and projects will be levered at higher interest rates, some 500bps higher than just a few years ago. But the upside could come if rates recover and projects are refinanced at lower rates with the PPA rate having been settled at today’s higher market. So if your view is that demand for solar hasn’t or will not change, but that interest rates could settle down, there’s some real upside in today’s market conditions. Just don’t get caught being too early or too late.
The Chart. In case you want to see the full history of Federal Reserve rates, see it here.
Managing Installer Cash Flow. Interest rates are the highest in 22 years, increasing solar financing costs and softening consumer demand for loan products. Businesses are feeling the pain of strained cash flows, labor costs and profitability pressures. Palmetto, a B2B technology company accelerating the adoption of clean energy, has announced a new partnership offering for solar installers to help stabilize cash flows and grow faster in today’s market. Built on top of Palmetto’s Clean Energy Operating Platform, this is a comprehensive suite of tools and services enabling installers to streamline operations, optimize performance, and increase profitability. Visit https://www.palmetto.com/finance or contact capital@palmetto.com for more.
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for November 3rd, 2023
Managing Installer Cash Flow. Interest rates are the highest in 22 years, increasing solar financing costs and softening consumer demand for loan products. Businesses are feeling the pain of strained cash flows, labor costs and profitability pressures. Palmetto, a B2B technology company accelerating the adoption of clean energy, has announced a new partnership offering for solar installers to help stabilize cash flows and grow faster in today’s market. Built on top of Palmetto’s Clean Energy Operating Platform, this is a comprehensive suite of tools and services enabling installers to streamline operations, optimize performance, and increase profitability. Visit https://www.palmetto.com/
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for November 2nd, 2023
Managing Installer Cash Flow. Interest rates are the highest in 22 years, increasing solar financing costs and softening consumer demand for loan products. Businesses are feeling the pain of strained cash flows, labor costs and profitability pressures. Palmetto, a B2B technology company accelerating the adoption of clean energy, has announced a new partnership offering for solar installers to help stabilize cash flows and grow faster in today’s market. Built on top of Palmetto’s Clean Energy Operating Platform, this is a comprehensive suite of tools and services enabling installers to streamline operations, optimize performance, and increase profitability. Visit https://www.palmetto.com/
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for October 31st, 2023
Happy Transmission Day. DOE’s loan office has selected three transmission projects for loan guarantees of $1.3billion. Great news, but let’s be real, this is a drop in the bucket. The bucket of need, bucket of pipeline and bucket of what support could be. Getting cheap and reliable energy is impossible if the transmission isn’t there to move it around to places that need it and have ridiculously high energy prices.
Do A Domestic Favor. One of my favorite workdays used to be going into the Quick Mount factory on Saturday mornings and work alongside our team. Mostly I was there to hand out donuts because I slowed the productivity down. But in some ways I loved being in the back of our office where the factory was, hearing the machines punching holes in l-brackets and pressure fitting the infamous elevated water seal, but also running the factory on Saturdays meant that we were running overtime to catch up on higher than forecasted sales the prior week. Unfortunately that factory isn’t there anymore, you could save a few cents moving that production to China. Installers, and more specifically distributors, can be brutal to drive that price down so I always hated losing an installer. If you’re an installer, figure out where your racking comes from and demand a domestic option, trust me the price difference is nothing compared to what a little negotiation on the inverter and panel could do for you. But you could be the reason a factory turns on the lights on Saturday morning.
Managing Installer Cash Flow. Interest rates are the highest in 22 years, increasing solar financing costs and softening consumer demand for loan products. Businesses are feeling the pain of strained cash flows, labor costs and profitability pressures. Palmetto, a B2B technology company accelerating the adoption of clean energy, has announced a new partnership offering for solar installers to help stabilize cash flows and grow faster in today’s market. Built on top of Palmetto’s Clean Energy Operating Platform, this is a comprehensive suite of tools and services enabling installers to streamline operations, optimize performance, and increase profitability. Visit https://www.palmetto.com/finance or contact capital@palmetto.com for more.
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for October 30th, 2023
Managing Installer Cash Flow. Interest rates are the highest in 22 years, increasing solar financing costs and softening consumer demand for loan products. Businesses are feeling the pain of strained cash flows, labor costs and profitability pressures. Palmetto, a B2B technology company accelerating the adoption of clean energy, has announced a new partnership offering for solar installers to help stabilize cash flows and grow faster in today’s market. Built on top of Palmetto’s Clean Energy Operating Platform, this is a comprehensive suite of tools and services enabling installers to streamline operations, optimize performance, and increase profitability. Visit https://www.palmetto.com/
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for October 26th, 2023
Managing Installer Cash Flow. Interest rates are the highest in 22 years, increasing solar financing costs and softening consumer demand for loan products. Businesses are feeling the pain of strained cash flows, labor costs and profitability pressures. Palmetto, a B2B technology company accelerating the adoption of clean energy, has announced a new partnership offering for solar installers to help stabilize cash flows and grow faster in today’s market. Built on top of Palmetto’s Clean Energy Operating Platform, this is a comprehensive suite of tools and services enabling installers to streamline operations, optimize performance, and increase profitability. Visit https://www.palmetto.com/
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for October 25th, 2023
Managing Installer Cash Flow. Interest rates are the highest in 22 years, increasing solar financing costs and softening consumer demand for loan products. Businesses are feeling the pain of strained cash flows, labor costs and profitability pressures. Palmetto, a B2B technology company accelerating the adoption of clean energy, has announced a new partnership offering for solar installers to help stabilize cash flows and grow faster in today’s market. Built on top of Palmetto’s Clean Energy Operating Platform, this is a comprehensive suite of tools and services enabling installers to streamline operations, optimize performance, and increase profitability. Visit https://www.palmetto.com/
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for October 24th, 2023
Content Channel. One of the interesting aspects of SolarWakeup is the daily readership looking for interesting content. So in an effort to gain new perspectives, I’d love to get your ideas on where you’re seeing interesting ideas, thoughts and advice. That way, we can leverage this digital auditorium for more content distribution. In many ways, this is the largest daily audience in the solar industry, akin to that you would see during the opening speeches of RE+.
Managing Installer Cash Flow. Interest rates are the highest in 22 years, increasing solar financing costs and softening consumer demand for loan products. Businesses are feeling the pain of strained cash flows, labor costs and profitability pressures. Palmetto, a B2B technology company accelerating the adoption of clean energy, has announced a new partnership offering for solar installers to help stabilize cash flows and grow faster in today’s market. Built on top of Palmetto’s Clean Energy Operating Platform, this is a comprehensive suite of tools and services enabling installers to streamline operations, optimize performance, and increase profitability. Visit https://www.palmetto.com/finance or contact capital@palmetto.com for more.
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for October 23rd, 2023
Resi’s Circularity. Interest rates rising, changes in net metering policies, and inventory within distribution is too high, those are the challenges facing installers across the Country. On the other side of the equation, interest rates and inflation are also challenging the utilities resulting in higher energy prices. Interest rates will come down but I’ve never seen electricity prices do the same which means that some advantages could come out of this for the residential market. At some point, distribution will have to move the inventory and there’s already talk of price cuts which will enable some margin retention by the installer as well. Lastly, look for innovation or as I like to call it, focusing on what you do best. This will enable everyone to partner more and drive more volume on the thing you do best.
Managing Installer Cash Flow. Interest rates are the highest in 22 years, increasing solar financing costs and softening consumer demand for loan products. Businesses are feeling the pain of strained cash flows, labor costs and profitability pressures. Palmetto, a B2B technology company accelerating the adoption of clean energy, has announced a new partnership offering for solar installers to help stabilize cash flows and grow faster in today’s market. Built on top of Palmetto’s Clean Energy Operating Platform, this is a comprehensive suite of tools and services enabling installers to streamline operations, optimize performance, and increase profitability. Visit https://www.palmetto.com/finance or contact capital@palmetto.com for more.
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Opinions:
Have a great day!
Yann