This is your SolarWakeup for March 19th, 2020
Have a great weekend! More coming next week.
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for March 18th, 2020
Last, Call Bracketology. Last Call for entries, you must register and get your bracket in before today’s tipoffs. The most important SolarWakeup day of the year is here, time to join this year’s March Madness bracket. As always, the winning bracket gets to write the column for a day as well as an awesome backpack from our friends at EnergeiaWorks, sponsors of the HotJobs. So head to ESPN Fantasy and look for the ‘SolarWakeup 2021’ group and use password solar to join. Feel free to invite your friends and colleagues to join the fun.
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for March 17th, 2020
A Big Market, Gets Bigger. This is the + decade. Solar+, that is. At the core is that the energy transition is happening, in real-time, in front of our eyes. There are still drivers that determine how big, how fast and how beneficial but now SEIA has a forecast for that. SEIA expects that over 324GW of solar will be installed this decade. That’s a lot and the reality is that we will build all of that and much more. We can be happy with that number but never satisfied and thus we need to continue to push the envelope and against any force that is attempting to slow the growth.
Not All Love. I’ve highlighted some of the early work on NEM 3.0 in California and now the utility joint proposal has been published, let’s just say that not everyone is on board with more solar.
Trust The Process. The filing caused market pressure on solar stocks yesterday. On day 1 of the process, we don’t know how it is going to play out and if we are passive in this then it will not be good for solar. This is not just a DG versus central discussion either, this is about controlling the benefit of the generation away from the market and consumers. But if we recognize that political involvement means more value to solar and clean energy companies, involvement that is both people power and dollars for advocacy, then the process should result in a fair outcome because that is what the people want.
Not For Spectators. A lobbyist told me in my very early years in solar that politics is not a spectator sport and it’s full contact, no light days on the Capitol. Ask yourself this, no matter your company, what are you doing to participate in the process?
Bracketology. The most important SolarWakeup day of the year is here, time to join this year’s March Madness bracket. As always, the winning bracket gets to write the column for a day. So head to ESPN Fantasy and look for the ‘SolarWakeup 2021’ group and use password solar to join. Feel free to invite your friends and colleagues to join the fun.
A Product Showcase. In two weeks, join CALSSA and the dozens of manufacturers in a product showcase. This is a free event if you register in advance, you can do that here. Absent in person events and a desire to stay in front of a computer all day, CALSSA brings you the best way to learn about the latest and greatest.
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for March 16th, 2020
Bracketology. The most important SolarWakeup day of the year is here, time to join this year’s March Madness bracket. As always, the winning bracket gets to write the column for a day. So head to ESPN Fantasy and look for the ‘SolarWakeup 2021’ group and use password solar to join. Feel free to invite your friends and colleagues to join the fun.
Farewell GTM. Emma Foehringer Merchant and Julian Spector post their last GTM articles. The end is really here.
Kerry Documents Inside Baseball. GM is hiring EV lobbyists and John Kerry is asking Wall Street to leverage their PR teams to advance climate talking points. Inside baseball is coming to the ClimateTech markets.
A Product Showcase. In two weeks, join CALSSA and the dozens of manufacturers in a product showcase. This is a free event if you register in advance, you can do that here. Absent in person events and a desire to stay in front of a computer all day, CALSSA brings you the best way to learn about the latest and greatest.
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for March 15th, 2020
Bracketology. The most important SolarWakeup day of the year is here, time to join this year’s March Madness bracket. As always, the winning bracket gets to write the column for a day. So head to ESPN Fantasy and look for the ‘SolarWakeup 2021’ group and use password solar to join. Feel free to invite your friends and colleagues to join the fun.
Farewell GTM. Jeff St. John has been writing for GTM since 2008 and he takes the pen to bid farewell. Like many of you, my journey in solar and now storage has run alongside that of GTM. With each step in my career hoping for a new mention on the news site and it was no different in my latest career move. GTM has been the leading insider platform for the better part of the decade and will be missed. I can’t wait to see where the current journalists land and who steps into the void left in the market.
All Eyes On ClimateTech. Energy Impact Partners has a ClimateTech index which has been outperforming the broader tech market. ClimateTech is a broad category in the index but let’s look at the next iteration which will create the next trillion dollar company. ClimateTech is the nexus where hardware and software meet to solve really important climate problems. That nexus allows for the scalability to manage enormous problems and turn them into opportunities.
Do More Infra. The headlines around an infrastructure bill are good on all sides of the argument. Utilities are asking for it, unions and contractors are for it, engineers and generators are begging for it and polling says that voters of both parties love it. So how does it actually get done? Bipartisan support has become a DC problem too hard to solve because there is no attack ad in a win-win policy.
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for March 12th, 2020
Today’s Takeaway. As you head into the weekend and read today’s top stories, I want you to think about the fundamental shift in our industry. For the past 15 years we have been focused on signing long term off take agreements in order to build solar generation, this has been one of the hardest and determining factors in development. Given solar produces energy when the sun shines, this is the bedrock of making the financial model work. Over the next 10 years, our industry will shift into a more complex but financially advantaged position where energy is part of the system and trading that energy drives the financial model. Read between the lines of what BP is saying and Google is planning for, it’s clear as day what this looks like in 5 years.
A Product Showcase. In two weeks, join CALSSA and the dozens of manufacturers in a product showcase. This is a free event if you register in advance, you can do that here. Absent in person events and a desire to stay in front of a computer all day, CALSSA brings you the best way to learn about the latest and greatest.
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for March 11th, 2020
The Software Imperative. We will get into this more in the future but important note to you today as it’s covered in the top article. As solar gets more involved in grid services, virtual power plants, and energy trading, it also gets closer to grid operations. For grid operations, many of the fleet management functions are digital/software focused but they also need to meet regulatory compliance and ensure cybersecurity is central to the function. Solar plus storage plants also have the generation functionality which makes the communication between hardware and software a central function that is hard to find when the experience is not deep given the newness of the market.
Perpetual Interconnect. When the power plant has a perpetual interconnect and opportunity to extend site leases, what happens to the power plant over time? Can you adjust the modules? Will the utility allow for new inverters or even upsizing? What about adding DC or AC-coupled energy storage? All of those revenue opportunities could prove to be a secondary market for existing projects.
Regan To EPA. Congratulations to the new EPA administrator, Michael Regan.
A Product Showcase. In two weeks, join CALSSA and the dozens of manufacturers in a product showcase. This is a free event if you register in advance, you can do that here. Absent in-person events and a desire to stay in front of a computer all day, CALSSA brings you the best way to learn about the latest and greatest.
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for March 10th, 2020
All Eyes On DC. With the American Rescue Plan headed to Biden’s desk today all eyes move towards the climate and infrastructure bill. It was Senator Manchin that said it could be as high as $4trillion investment and it launches Mayor/Secretary Pete into the spotlight. In bipartisan formats, energy storage standalone ITC is center stage alongside the rest of the ITC expansion/extension. This major bill would be a decade of infrastructure improvement for grids, roads, bridges and more but likely the most meaningful expansion of climate policy in the history of the Country.
Manchin’s Role And Rule. The West Virginia Senator has been saying that he will not take the bill up in reconciliation and exclude Republicans from the start. Lindsay Graham is posturing some talk about adding the GOP to the climate discussion, which quite frankly would be a welcome addition from my perspective. Manchin holds the key as the 50th vote and could be pressuring the GOP to get involved or risk being left out as they did in the latest COVID stimulus. The reality is that all infrastructure is local and when it comes to our market, it would mean hundreds of thousands of well paying jobs for many years across America.
Standard Standards. NREL Is out with a new permitting database assessing the state of permitting, in progress and inspection across 20,000 jurisdictions. Ahead of the launch of SolarAPP, NREL is showing that even though there are national standards for solar construction, there are no standards carried across the Country. NREL is currently processing and selecting the administrator for the SolarAPP platform which should help carry the program into the next phase of launch.
New Energy Demand. Markets continue to understate the role and impact that EVs will have on the grid. When we need power, how much we need and where it’s needed.
A Product Showcase. In two weeks, join CALSSA and the dozens of manufacturers in a product showcase. This is a free event if you register in advance, you can do that here. Absent in person events and a desire to stay in front of a computer all day, CALSSA brings you the best way to learn about the latest and greatest.
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for March 9th, 2020
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Yann
This is your SolarWakeup for March 8th, 2020
In Case You Missed It. I joined FlexGen, the second largest integrator in the US, last week. Read here. I want to give you a behind the scenes of why I joined FlexGen at what I see as a crucial moment in our market and the energy transition.
The Macros. Renewables are going to continue taking addition share of the generation portfolio. Politics will drive that continuation to some degree but cost and emissions are the leading factors. Consumers are leading the charge by adding solar at record levels, remember my 1million solar homes forecast a few years from now. The climate related impacts with hurricanes on the east coast, fires in the west and heat/freeze temps causing new grid peaks. Lastly, with solar costs down 90% since I joined the industry in 2006, battery costs are also coming down. The ability for solar and storage to be market makers not market takers is a fundamental reason for me making this leap.
Grid Needs. Natural disasters caused the grid to shutoff but the heat waves and winter freezes really put the pressure on the grid. This behind the scenes in ERCOT shows just how close to long term disaster the grid came. A grid only works when generation and demand are close to matching up and when either side of the chain falls down, there is a slack in the line that can cause major issue. This slack is optimized in the ancillary services portion of the power market and result in what you would imagine the details of grid services is. So whether it was front of the meter batteries or a virtual power plant, batteries play a major role in this dispatch capability.
A ClimateTech Play. ClimateTech is the nexus where hardware meets software to enable the energy transition happening today. For the past 10 years, FlexGen has been building the most advanced software platform that spans from electron controls to trading integration in the energy management system. The energy storage systems are true systems, power electronics, controls and battery racks brought together by hardware vendors with billions of R&D in play to make technological leaps. For us, as integrators, we will always bring the most bankable technology to our partner EPCs, IPPs and other asset owners. That’s the advantage of being hardware neutral in clean tech, something I’ve believed in since making that mistake in the 08/09 years.
Maturing Market. Like solar, energy storage is finding its comfort with all of the market participants. Who does what and how does it work are going to be solved. As a technology partner to the market, Kelcy said it best. “We didn’t just wake up and say, ‘Let’s make this software capability because we think it could create a lot of value," he added. "Our software platform has been built over a decade with all the learnings and scars and bruising that occurs in being on the front edge of innovation."
Learning Together. Over the coming weeks, months and years, I hope to bring you along my learning curve. You’ve come to know me as wanting to be in every room and every conversation and I want to learn from you and explain what market discoveries I’m making as we work this in parallel. I know that we will make 100% clean energy grids a reality and that means we all have to do a lot more of what we are doing, so let’s go forth and execute together. In the meantime, I’ll be here every morning and you can hit reply anytime to say hello or ask a question.
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Yann