By Frank Andorka, Senior Correspondent

What Happened:Thanks to a grant from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Sunshot Initiative’s Solar In Your Community Challenge, one coal-country Ohio town is moving toward a community solar installation.

• A group called Upgrade Ohio is trying to change the town’s laws in a way that would allow regular citizens – not just wealthy investors – get in on the ground floor of the array.
• Despite being in the heart of coal country, the citizens of Athens are excited about the prospect of opening up a new energy future for the poverty-stricken area.

Richland Avenue bridge, spanning portions of Athens, Ohio, with the Western Hills in the background
By OhioOat – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=19870392

SolarWakeup’s View:  Full disclosure: Athens, Ohio, is home to Ohio University, which both my parents attended and, if it hadn’t been for some health challenges, I would have attended myself.

With those biases in mind, however, I still think it’s hella cool is this story about Upgrade Ohio, a community group trying to change the city’s laws to allow everyday citizens (instead of just wealthy donors) to buy into a community solar project.

Upgrade Ohio, an energy advocacy group, was funded as part of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Sunshot Initiative’s $5 million Solar In Your Community Challenge and is working to change the energy landscape of the area. And while it is home to Ohio University, Athens, Ohio, is also one of the more bone-deep poverty-stricken areas in the state. Located in the heart of Appalachia, it was solidly coal country – but Upgrade Ohio is in the process of changing that. Said Executive Director Sarah Conley-Ballew to the Energy News Network:

It’s wrong to think that this region has only a coal-country mindset. There is a push to be new energy leaders in new ways. We want to generate our own power because we want to be independent from the extractive powers that have made decisions for this region for so long.

We want to take the coal and gas-dependent economy and make it renewably based. We need a bold and different strategy.

In today’s political climate, it’s easy to forget the vital role the Sunshot Initiative has played in moving solar beyond its traditional strongholds. The Upgrade Ohio project is a good reminder that its future must always be part of any funding conversation (and serve as a reminder, all propaganda to the contrary, that the solar industry supports research in all aspects of the industry, large and small).

More:

In Ohio town, energy ‘locavores’ drive demand for community solar (Energy News Network)

Bonus

This is my ACTUAL alma mater, of which I am SO proud. Marching through Kauke Arch being led by bagpipes on graduation was amazing.

By Frank Andorka, Senior Correspondent

What Happened:And now in this corner, from the other end of the Section 201 tariff case, comes the news that Suniva is literally being sold for parts by its creditor SQN Capital Management.:

• Who could have seen this coming? (Everyone. Everyone saw this coming.)
• SQN Capital Management is the same outfit that famously offered to sell Suniva off to the Chinese Chamber of Commerce for a cool $55 million left on a Central Park bench at 3 a.m.
• Now they’ve gotten the OK to sell off the manufacturing equipment at a public auction, does anyone really think they’re going to plow the money back into the company to restart production? No. No one does.

From Suniva’s Facebook page, that day they all got into scrubs and delivered a solar panel by hand.

SolarWakeup’s View:  Lordy, when it rains it pours.

This morning I got to write about the end of SolarWorld as an independent company as its assets were purchased by SunPower, which could signal an exit for them from the utility-scale market. Now I have to write about Suniva, the other Keystone Cop in the tariff travesty and the one that started it all.

Unfortunately, on this side of the ledger, there is no feel-good story about saving jobs for the citizens of Hillsboro, Oregon. In this scenario, the company’s major creditor SQN Capital Management – who offered about a year ago to settle the trade case with the Chinese Chamber of Commerce for $55 million and a bucket of balls – has now gotten permission from the bankruptcy judge to sell Suniva off for parts, specifically its manufacturing equipment, at a public auction.

I’m going to go out on a limb and say that if SQN gets the $58 million Suniva owes it out of the equipment sale, it is going to take the money and run. And to say selling the production equipment would make it unlikely Suniva will ever return to production is like calling the Pope Catholic or me a Bernie Kosar fan. In other words, “Duh.”

All of this news today leads me to ponder the following: If one of the trade-tariff companies is being sold and the other is going to disappear into the cornfield, what the hell did we spend the past year fighting for (or against, depending on what side you were on)? Why did we have this extremely long, divisive battle if the two main combatants were going to leave the field early anyway?

One of my friends said it was all for the lawyers; another said it was to pump up SolarWorld’s valuation. Both could be true, I suppose.

All I know is that I have wasted far too much ink and breath on this divisive issue. Maybe this sordid chapter of solar’s history is finally coming to an end (with a whimper, not a bang).

More:

Suniva creditor wins U.S. bankruptcy court approval to sell company’s assets (Reuters)

Could We Finally Be Rid Of Suniva? (SolarWakeup)