This is your SolarWakeup for September 13th, 2021
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for September 10th, 2021
Let’s Recap. The big news this week comes from Biden’s plan to get 45% solar by 2050, which means adding an average of 65GW per year over that time. That is going to require many gears to line up in sync with each other including issues like trade and training.
And Aligned Policy. With such a large goal in mind, it would behoove the administration to work with States including California where regulators and legislators are threatening to take a giant leap in the wrong direction by favoring incumbent 20th century generation over a more resilient grid.
The Right Direction. An excellent piece from WSJ at the top today highlights the things that will enable a more resilient grid. I may be biased but Kelcy Pegler, CEO of FlexGen, puts it best, “We’ve exhausted all reasonable excuses for not making our grid more intelligent.” Plus check out FlexGen’s new logo and job opportunities on the Linkedin page.
Tesla’s Vertical Integration. In the past two weeks, Tesla has announced a few different grid related strategies that show signs of complete vertical integration beyond being a hardware supplier. First was the filing to become an energy retailer in Texas, interesting for the fact that non-stationary power (in potential energy form) exists in the driveway of every Tesla car owner. I’ve always been curious as to why Tesla referred to its battery business as stationary power but for the reason that the opposite also exists. Second, Tesla appears to be building an energy trading arm which could either be a monetizing effort for the first fact or even go beyond to building out a fleet of stationary power and building the IPP. I clearly play checkers against Elon’s chess moves but I wouldn’t be shocked to see Tesla customers being a segment of this total integrated effort to monetize the energy transition.
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This is your SolarWakeup for September 9th, 2021
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This is your SolarWakeup for September 8th, 2021
Helping NOLA. It’s a triple bad news sandwich. We were supposed to be able to get SPI back on track this year and almost everyone we spoke to was going to attend. Then the delta variant took a toll on the local community causing a good amount of cancellations of exhibitors and attendees. Show organizers were focused on still creating a safe event for those that wanted to get to and then Hurricane Ida came in. The issue is that everyone loses, the community doesn’t benefit from the economic stimulus a show like SPI brings to town, attendees don’t get to meet with partners and clients and the solar industry loses a vital revenue stream that is much needed for the never ending fight for policy that enables our market. Then there is the destruction of the community at the hands of the hurricane like others before that hurt the most vulnerable.
Laudato Si Continued. The Pope is not giving up his message on climate change. Since writing Laudato Is, Pope Francis has merged the message of climate change with preserving the planet and pushing for action by dominant nations. When the Pope speaks, he does so in many languages but he is also speaking to those that see him as the leader of the the catholic church. It’s the duality of the message, especially when heard by catholics that happen to be politicians as well, that stings the hardest because personal causes are in conflict with the message from the church.
The Nuclear Bailouts. Illinois is preparing a $600million bailouts for two nuclear power plants in the State. Typically these are powerful legislative vehicles that can move climate policy forward alongside the bailout, we’ve seen this in New York and New Jersey to name two.
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This is your SolarWakeup for September 7th, 2021
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This is your SolarWakeup for September 3rd, 2021
Multi Jurisdictional Solar Battles. As many of you have read and seen on the news, solar has to continue to fight to maintain access to markets that allow consumers to make their energy generation choice. In California, as fires burn like never before the fight happens across the board from licensing, regulatory with net metering, grid operators with curtailment and interconnection and even legislatively. None of this comes easy or cheap and participating financially is the hard truth for companies that want to compete in fair and open markets. Please take a moment and help CALSSA shore up for these fights.
Manchin Speaks. Senator Manchin wants a strategic pause for the reconciliation bill, arguing that more stimulus and inflation are reasons to halt the process and not do anything with this kind of price tag. With Senator Synema in a similar camp, it’ll be a showdown on the democratic side to see how to either do both infrastructure bills, just the bipartisan or neither and Pelosi is front and center on this.
Miami Wind Codes. Once again a single hurricane has cause incredible wind damage on the Gulf Coast while dumping a foot of rain on the New York/New Jersey area. Pictures of the flooded subways and floating cars show that the infrastructure isn’t meant to withstand the new reality of storms where they normally never went. Meanwhile transmission in Louisiana is still down and 80% of the oil and gas production is offline.
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This is your SolarWakeup for September 2nd, 2021
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This is your SolarWakeup for September 1st, 2021
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This is your SolarWakeup for August 31st, 2021
Ida Sends A Message. Hurricane Ida followed a path eerily similar to Hurricane Katrina and took on New Orleans the gulf coast of Louisiana including shutting down almost 100% of the oil and gas infrastructure in the State. One of the major infrastructure impacts is the destruction of a major transmission tower that has knocked out power to New Orleans and over 1 million customers. This is another knock at the attempt to return to SPI which was already facing a weary audience worried about COVID levels in the area. None of that may matter because it may just be necessary to give local resources the ability to focus on caring for those that are going to be without power for several weeks in heat and humidity without running water. As the solar industry is scheduled to be at the convention center in just 3 weeks, I wonder if that space may just be needed to care for the local community. With as caring as the solar industry is, I can see the organizers making a tough choice for the second year in a row and finding an alternative path forward that isn’t SPI in NOLA as much as we all really wanted it to happen. If you were planning on going and end up saving the travel resource, consider aiding some local charities that will emerge like the World Central Kitchen that is already on the ground and then plan on attending an upcoming solar conference to help the industry financially to make sure they have the resources to fight. Whether that’s an online event or a local conference, groups like CALSSA and SEIA are engaged on many fronts from licensing, net metering, trade and just plain political attacks by well funded incumbent actors.
Ocean’s Energy Storage. As a part time weatherman, like all Floridians, we pay attention to the barometric pressure of hurricanes. The lower the pressure, the more organized and strong the storm will be. Pair pressure with wind speeds and speed of travel, and you know whether you should get out of dodge. Hurricane Ida’s pressure dropped over 50mb down to 929mb in less than 24 hours. In context, Hurricanes Katrina and Andrew came in at 920 and 922 respectively so Ida was no walk in the park. These pressures have increasingly been below 950 and the reason may sit in the upper 700 meters of the ocean where scientists have been measuring the stored energy, in the form of heat (leave your physics corrections at the door), over the past 100 years. Warmer oceans means more stored energy for storms to feed off and also what has been driving storms farther north like last week’s storm that hit New York and Rhode Island.
Evacuating Lake Tahoe. Ski resort cameras are capturing the darkness of the Caldor fire running rampant in the Lake Tahoe valley causing evacuation orders. You would think that all of this climate change related destruction in California would be a kickstarter to ensure the most reliable and resilient grid brought to you by the solar industry but lookout for the attacks that are still coming our way, something is in the water these days that make my head spin.
What This All Means. The concept of designing an engineering solution to the weakest link is true for most problems but it’s central to the energy transition and the need for solutions that are driving the most resilient and intelligent grid possible. We have the tools available to us but the collective we need to act on them. Part of that is the resiliency of duplication and not having to rely on a single massive power plant on the end of a single giant transmission line. The reinforcement and duplication is the resiliency that enables the grid to withstand major attacks whether natural or otherwise.
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This is your SolarWakeup for August 30th, 2021
A Note To Adam. As many of you may have seen and read, Adam Browning is stepping down from his role as Executive Director at Vote Solar. Vote Solar was my first touchpoint into the world of solar policy in 2007 when the organization, as it had prior and many times after, fought for net metering and interconnection in Florida. The Sunshine State still benefits from their work in 07/08. Mind you, as I started to develop opinions about solar policy, I didn’t always agree with the organization and questioned why Vote Solar was fighting things like new natural gas plants in Michigan. I don’t think this is overstepping my relationship with Adam but one time Vote Solar agreed to a truce in Arizona where solar gained fairly little and I called Vote Solar out on it. Adam, the professional that he is, reached out and taught me an important lesson that he learned from his grandmother; “if you want ponies, go to the petting zoo.” The real world isn’t a straight line to everything you want and I still think of those ponies when I’m presented with a situation that I don’t love either result of. That’s the lesson I think about when I reflect on Adam’s 20 year leadership at Vote Solar. So thank you to Adam for your part of getting us to over 50% of the population with 100% clean energy targets and defending solar across the Country, you can be proud of the work you did and I can’t wait to see what’s next, somehow I doubt it involves a petting zoo!
The Senate Budget. The legislative bodies are working on the budget and we’re back to ‘all eyes on Synema and Manchin’ to see what they are going to do with the budget. They know that this will likely cause the bipartisan infrastructure bill to fold if the budget doesn’t satisfy the progressives in the House. Synema has said that she won’t support the $3.5trillion price tag and more will likely not support the pay fors and tax increases that some have proposed.
Look At Gas Prices. Natural gas prices are up over $4/mmBTU, blowing up every fuel cost projection in rate based natural gas power plants. So I remind you once again, rate based natural gas plants are the most subsidized power plants in the entire energy market today.
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