While the PUC will ultimately rule on net metering, a group of interested parties—including the state’s utilities and the Granite State Hydropower Association—agreed on a settlement that calls for the rate to stay the same for two years.

The settlement also calls for the electric utilities to file a NEM time-of-use rate two years from the approval of what they’re calling NEM 2.1. In response to claims that NEM shifts costs to non-solar ratepayers, the settlement calls for the utilities to impose application fees for net metered projects to reduce the administrative costs borne by non-net-metering customers. Fees suggested range from $200 to $1,000 per project.

The state’s leading clean energy advocacy group, Clean Energy NH, has sent a rallying cry in support of the settlement. Executive director, Sam Evans-Brown told pv magazine USA that he’s hopeful that the commissioners won’t cut the current compensation rate, but he said “we have seen with this commission that they are hostile to certain types of utility programs. This was most evident in their order in the Energy Efficiency docket from 2020, which was overturned unanimously on a bipartisan basis by New Hampshire lawmakers.”

Much evidence has been entered into the record for Docket 22-060, yet Evans-Brown said in the past, the order in the previous docket was not based on any evidence that was entered into the record, so Clean Energy NH is afraid that history may repeat itself.

The history of net metering in New Hampshire goes back to 1998 when NEM, a policy that provides credit to rate payers on utility bills for the amount of solar energy sent to the grid, was first enacted in New Hampshire. At the time it supported both solar generation as well as small-scale hydropower and it provided net credits at the retail rate which was 17 cents per kWh.

In 2017 NH’s NEM was cut to around 14.7 cents per kWh for small (<100 kW) systems and 10 cents per kWh for large projects compared to between 13 and 25 cents per kWh in Maine, and about 16 cents per kWh in Vermont.

Source: Clean Energy NH

While the net metering rate has been low in NH, the cost of electricity is high. New Hampshire currently has the 8^th highest electricity rate in the country, averaging 23.1 cents per kWh.

Furthermore, while solar would ease this cost burden for many ratepayers, the state is not known as a solar energy powerhouse. The state currently gets 1.94% of its electricity from solar, compared to neighboring Massachusetts that gets 23.75% of its electricity from the sun. NH and is ranked 41^st in the nation according to the Solar Energy Industries Association. That rank is expected to drop to 45^th over the next five years.

If the NH PUC chooses to reduce or eliminate net metering in New Hampshire, solar in the state may be affected. pv magazine USA spoke with Dan Weeks, vice president at ReVision Energy, New Hampshire’s largest solar installer. Weeks said that net metering has been “the critical foundation for thousands of families, plus housing authorities, nonprofits, businesses, and towns to go solar and get at least a portion of the value that they provide to the grid back in net metering credits.”

Weeks noted that right now net metering in NH is good through 2040, which is only 15 years away. With 20 years being the “minimum accepted duration for investing in projects,” he said ReVision is hoping the PUC leaves net metering in tact and extends the duration.

“We think that’s a very modest task,” said Weeks. “And the fact that all of the regulated utilities, as well as the consumer advocates, plus industry and environmentalists are in alignment should make it an easy decision for the PUC commissioners. But we’re also reading the signals showing that they could go in a very drastic direction, and that concerns us very much.”

California’s current solar conundrum is an example of what could happen to New Hampshire’s solar market. The updated net metering rule that was implemented in April 2023, called NEM 3.0, cut compensation for exported rooftop solar generation by roughly 80%. Since then interconnection queues show an 80% drop in installation applications. The California Solar and Storage Association (CALSSA) reported that nearly 17,000 rooftop solar jobs, about 22% of the workforce, were lost this year as a result. Solar Insure, which backs many installation companies in the state, told pv magazine USA that its data shows 75% of solar installers are now in the “high risk” category following CPUC’s decision to implement NEM 3.0, with SunPower being the most notable bankruptcy among many.

Comments on the potential rate change can be emailed to ClerksOffice@puc.nh.gov. Clean Energy NH advises that comments be sent by August 30, 2024.

Which solar inverter manufacturers are most financially stable?  Sinovoltaics, in its latest financial stability ranking of inverter manufacturers lists Hoymiles, Eaton and others at the top. 

Biden issues new proclamation on solar cell tariffs  Tariffs on solar cells remain, but volume increases from 5 GW to 12.5 GW.

What happens when solar is installed without homeowner’s permission A Connecticut couple and several companies including Sunrun have been sued by the state’s Attorney General for forging signatures, faking a voices, and unlawfully installing solar panels on a home without the owners’ consent.

Ebon Solar to invest nearly $1 billion in U.S. solar cell factory The solar cell manufacturing facility is to be located in New Mexico and expected to bring over 900 jobs to the area.

IRA 2-year anniversary: A look at its successes and failures David Burton, attorney with Norton Rose Fulbright and specialist in energy tax law, looks at tax credit transfer, domestic content, energy communities, prevailing wage and more.

SunPower goes bankrupt The company, one of the longest running solar companies in the U.S., spun off its manufacturing business in 2020 to focus more squarely on rooftop solar as demand surged. Since then, demand cooled considerably, and, under a high interest rate environment, the strategy proved fatal for the company.

Goldman Sachs invests $440 million in renewable independent power producer  The strategic investment in BrightNight will support the development of utility, commercial, and industrial solar and energy storage projects.

More money is going into solar than all other forms of generation combined, reaching $500 billion in 2024 The International Energy Agency projects that solar will attract more investment than all other electricity generation sources combined. Global energy spending is set to surpass $3 trillion for the first time this year.

Republicans request continuation of IRA post-January Eighteen Republican members of the U.S. House of Representatives have urged House Speaker Mike Johnson to preserve the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) if their party takes control of the political reins in January.

Sunrun stock rises on strong cash generation in Q2 earnings The residential solar and energy storage provider increased its battery attachment rates and net subscriber value of its customers.

The evolving art and science of agrivoltaics At Bluewave, integrating solar technology with traditional farming practices isn’t just a concept, it’s the new standard. Jesse Robertson-DuBois, director of sustainable solar development, shares insights on the transformative journey of agrivoltaics within the industry.

Renewables “cheaper and faster” than methane, says nation’s largest utility NextEra’s Q2 2024 quarterly earnings report shows significant growth in the company’s renewable pipeline. However, the group, which is typically exacting, refused to put a hard number on their future demand growth expectations.

Battery fire shuts down California highway A utility-scale battery delivery overturned on a highway after the truck carrying the batteries collided with a car, overcorrected, tipped to the side and dumped its cargo, leading to a fire that lasted more than 24 hours.

Bill aims to cut 45X tax credits for Chinese solar makers While the lucrative tax credits has attracted clean energy manufacturers from around the world to build factories in the U.S., the fact that many of the new manufacturing facilities are from Chinese companies has created a controversy that this new bill aims to solve.

Massive 900 MW solar project designed to preserve agricultural land Brookfield Renewable Partners filed a notice of intent for a 900 MW solar project in Oregon that will be installed in ribbons along the edge of a field to allow for continued agricultural use of the land

Residential solar company SunPower stock crashes 70% The company’s share price fell below $1 as it announced it is halting some operations and ending its lease and power purchase agreement offerings, among other actions.

How long do residential solar panels last? Multiple factors affect the productive lifespan of a residential solar panel. In the first part of this series, we look at the solar panels themselves.

U.S. Senators introduce comprehensive energy permitting reform act Joe Manchin (I-WV) and John Barrasso (R-WY) released the Energy Permitting Reform Act of 2024, promising to accelerate the permitting processes for energy and mineral projects of all types in the U.S.

WoodMac says global solar tracker shipments grew by 28% in 2023 Global tracker shipments reached 92 GWdc last year, according to WoodMackenzies’ latest report. The US accounted for the majority of the global market, with three US-based manufacturers, Nextracker, Array Technologies and GameChange Solar, ranking as the three largest shippers in the world.

Interview: My experience as a battery energy storage homeowner What is it like being a residential solar and energy storage prosumer living in California? Ahmad Faruqui, economist-at-large, shares his perspective with pv magazine USA .

Elastocalorics could replace heat pumps, air conditioning systems Elastocalorics have the potential to replace current air conditioning and heating systems, offering significant energy savings when paired with technologies such as photovoltaics.

First Solar probes potential infringement of TOPCon patents First Solar says it is evaluating potential infringement of its patents for its TOPCon tech, secured through the acquisition of TetraSun in 2013. The U.S. thin-film solar module manufacturer has not named the companies involved or given a timeline for the investigation.

Global solar installations to nearly quadruple by 2033 Wood Mackenzie forecasts 4.7 TW of solar capacity to be built between 2024 and 2033, with China accounting for about 50% of the growth.

U.S. manufacturer Toledo Solar closes business The Ohio based thin-film solar module producer was sued last year by First Solar, which alleged that Toledo Solar sold Malaysian-made First Solar modules under the Toledo name. It has announced it will cease operations.

Solar tariffs could “unintentionally cede U.S. leadership in the solar industry”  A report from Clean Energy Associates (CEA) and the American Council on Renewable Energy shows how antidumping and countervailing duty (AD/CVD) tariffs create cost issues not just for imported solar panels, but for U.S.-made solar panels as well. 

Solar panel cleaning with electromagnetic waves Three companies, including Massachusetts startup Sol Clarity, are experimenting with electrodynamic screen systems to clean solar panels using minimal electricity and no water.

Solar supply chain, technology trends, and policy update A report from Clean Energy Associates (CEA) provides the latest on global and regional solar supply chains, technological trends, and market impacts from policy.

Tesla battery deployment jumped way up while Megapack is down Tesla revealed a significant increase in energy storage deployment, officially reporting revenue for 9.4 GWh of deployed storage products.

Experts consider speedy utility-scale interconnection in Texas going nationwide Some experts shared data to back up their praise for the “connect and manage” approach used by Texas grid operator ERCOT, while others speaking on an industry panel explained their reservations.

Public input sought for large-scale solar project in Arizona  According to the application submitted by developer EDF Renewables, the proposed Socorro project will sit on 3,066 acres on nearly 6,000-acres of public land and it would produce up to 350 MW of solar energy along with battery energy storage.

Yotta Energy launches ‘panel-level storage’ package for C&I solar U.S. storage and inverter specialist Yotta Energy says its new package has several advantages compared to conventional C&I solar storage solutions.

Lithium-ion battery fire safety starts with the manufacturer Fluence America’s president says stakeholder and first responder engagement is necessary to keep failures from becoming newsworthy events.

Cowboy Solar, largest solar project in Wyoming moves forward The $1.2 billion project will be built by Enbridge, with 771 MW expected to be fully operational by 2027.

Battery energy storage tariffs tripled; domestic content rules updated Breaking down U.S. market impacts on energy storage from recent policy changes with insights from Clean Energy Associates.

]]> https://pv-magazine-usa.com/2024/05/17/u-s-solar-industry-week-in-review-10/feed/ 0 104344 https://pv-magazine-usa.com/2024/05/10/u-s-solar-industry-week-in-review-9/ https://pv-magazine-usa.com/2024/05/10/u-s-solar-industry-week-in-review-9/#respond Fri, 10 May 2024 21:00:51 +0000 https://pv-magazine-usa.com/?p=104154 pv magazine USA spotlights news stories of the past week including market trends, project updates, policy changes and more.]]> pv magazine USA spotlights news stories of the past week including market trends, project updates, policy changes and more.

California approves uncapped fixed charges on electricity bills The California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) voted to approve a controversial electricity rate rule called the Income-Graduated Fixed Charge, enabling utilities to assess an average $24 monthly fixed charge on residential bills.–roughly double the national average in the United States. It applies to all customers, regardless of how much electricity they consume. 

Cypress Creek Renewables constructs 208 MW / 80 MWh solar-plus-storage facility in Texas The site reached commercial operation on May 2, adding enough capacity to the grid to serve the equivalent of 41,600 homes in the Brackettville, Texas area. Over $11.5 million in tax revenues are expected to be generated for the county by the project, along with $11.7 million earmarked for the Bracket Independent School District.

Microsoft announces largest-ever corporate procurement of renewable energy The tech giant signed a power purchase agreement for 10.5 GW of renewable energy to help power its datacenters with clean energy. Cost to build is projected at more than $11.5 billion to build, according to Bloomberg NEF.

California hits energy storage milestone Batteries dominate the evening grid with 10 GW/40 GWh of capacity.

New green bank to support distributed solar and storage in the Appalachian region The Green Bank for Rural America will support community lenders in Appalachian communities to finance climate-supporting projects including distributed solar and storage. The bank and four others received a total of $6 billion in federal awards.

]]> https://pv-magazine-usa.com/2024/05/03/u-s-solar-industry-week-in-review-8/feed/ 0 103899 https://pv-magazine-usa.com/2024/04/26/u-s-solar-industry-week-in-review-7/ https://pv-magazine-usa.com/2024/04/26/u-s-solar-industry-week-in-review-7/#respond Fri, 26 Apr 2024 21:00:56 +0000 https://pv-magazine-usa.com/?p=103651 pv magazine USA spotlights news stories of the past week including market trends, project updates, policy changes and more.]]> pv magazine USA spotlights news stories of the past week including market trends, project updates, policy changes and more.

Solar manufacturers want anti-dumping tariffs enforced The American Alliance for Solar Manufacturing Trade Committee, which includes First Solar, Qcells, Meyer Burger, REC Silicon, and others said the current “manufacturing renaissance” in the United States is under threat from heavily subsidized Chinese cells and modules that are alleged to be in infraction with antidumping and countervailing duty (AD/CVD) law.

SunPower to close business units, cut about 26% of workforce SunPower’s struggles reflect a market-wide retraction in residential solar, which has been battered by worsened economics from high interest rates and unfavorable policy and ratemaking changes. We did have an inkling when revenues reported last December reflected a 28% year-over-year decline, while operating expenses increased, and net income resulted in a loss of $123.9 million.

President Biden announced the ambition to upgrade 100,000 miles of transmission lines over the next five years  The Grid Resilience and Innovation Partnership (GRIP) program intends to fund upgrades and modernization of the transmission and distribution system to increase reliability and resilience to prepare the grid for extreme weather as well as to ensure delivery of affordable, clean electricity to all communities across the nation.

IRS issues final guidance for clean energy tax credit transferability Under a tax credit transfer transaction, renewable energy developers and owners are essentially able to sell tax credits for cash, making financing easier for new clean energy projects. The transferability option is generally open to the entities that are not covered by the direct pay option.

NREL updates interactive chart of solar cell efficiency The highest research cell efficiency recorded in the chart is 47.6%, for a four-junction cell developed by Germany’s Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems. Also included is the 33.9% world record efficiency achieved in November by Longi for a perovskite-silicon tandem solar cell and the 27.09% efficiency achieved by the same company for a heterojunction back contact solar cell.

Qcells leads petition to revoke bifacial exemption The bifacial exemption may be revoked once again, this time by the Biden Administration following a petition by Qcells, which has a large manufacturing footprint in the United States. Reuters reported that, Qcells, the solar division of Korean conglomerate Hanwha, sent the formal petition to the U.S. Trade Representative on Feb. 23 requesting the exemption to be revoked.

Quoted solar prices decreased on the marketplace, falling 3.5% to $2.80  For the first time since 2021, quoted solar prices decreased on the marketplace, falling 3.5% to $2.80 per watt for quotes in the second half of 2023. The median system size over that period was 11.3 kW, leading to an average quoted system price of $31,640 (before any associated tax credits or incentives). These prices are the lowest since mid-2020.

DOE lays out roadmap to advance interconnections of renewables The report presents 35 interconnection improvement solutions developed through a DOE stakeholder engagement process, known as the Interconnection Innovation e-Xchange (i2X) program.

Puerto Rico net metering law at risk  Central to Puerto Rico’s future success with residential solar is a law that extended the territory’s net metering policy for solar through 2031. Yet that law, known as Act 10-2024, has been challenged by the Financial Oversight and Management Board (FOMB) for Puerto Rico, a body created by federal law.

Important Q1 solar policies across 50 states  The Q1 2024 report by NC Clean Energy Technology Center finds that 43 states plus Washington DC and Puerto Rico took a total of 163 actions related to distributed solar policy and rate design. Read about what works for or against the advancement of solar energy.

California Supreme Court takes a look at NEM 3.0  The controversial rooftop solar rulemaking decision has risen to the Supreme Court of California, with the state’s highest court granting review for a petition filed by the Center for Biological Diversity.

Eyes were on the sky for the 2024 solar eclipse  With an estimated 6.5 GW of solar in the path of the eclipse, load balancing, battery storage and the significance of solar energy in the U.S. was brought front and center.

Texas, now the number one state for solar, is seeing a drop in use of natural gas  The Lone Star State is seeing tangible changes to its daily electricity supply, lowering the need for natural gas peaker plants, said the Energy Information Administration.

Despite opposition, 4.95 MW agrivoltaic community solar project in Illinois moves ahead Lightstar Renewables’ Nesler Road project will grow hay along with enough solar energy to power 1,100 Illinois homes.

Renewables and storage interconnection backlog grew about 30% last year  With grid interconnection reform yet to take place, solar and energy storage wait in line for studies to be completed. The growing backlog of projects awaiting grid interconnection studies called a major bottleneck for project development, according to a recent study by Lawrence Berkeley National Labs.

California officials call for repeal of $24 fixed rate fee Although it’s better than the proposed $128 fee, a coalition objects to the $24 fixed monthly charge that the California Public Utilities Commission approved to be levied on customers, regardless of how much electricity is used at home.

California solar distributor goes out of business AEE Solar, a California-based solar distributor owned by Sunrun, announced it is going out of business in early May and placing its remaining inventory on clearance sale before closing operations. Such closures could be the result of weakened demand for distributed solar, particularly in California, since NEM 3.0 went into effect.

The U.S.  may soon face another ongoing tariff enforcement saga Another round of antidumping and countervailing (AD/CVD) tariffs may be on the way, accord to a note from Roth Capital Partners. Not good news for the solar industry as it experienced project delays and cancellations when AD/CVD tariff enforcement threatened supply in the past.

PPAs are all the rage. Power purchase agreements (PPAs) have emerged as the go-to financing tool for commercial and industrial (C&I) solar adopters looking to avoid upfront costs and realize immediate energy savings. Read about Microsoft recently entering into two power purchase agreements for a total of 400 MW of solar energy from Texas solar plants.

U.S. DOE invests $4 million in thermal energy storage  Thermal energy storage offers a low-cost alternative to existing energy storage technologies, and DOE is providing funding for a pilot demonstration program at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory on a multi-day energy storage system using heated sand.

California pivots to propose $24 average fixed fee to electric bills  The Public Utilities Commission said the new billing structure will include a reduction of electricity rates by 5 to 7 cents per kilowatt hour.

Clean Energy Connector pilot launches in Illinois, New Mexico and Washington D.C. The software tool is designed to connect eligible households to community solar projects through the Department of Health and Human Services’ HHS’s Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP).

Environmental lifecycle assessment of PERC solar modules  IEA PVPS Task 12 analyzes the environmental impact of passivated emitter and rear cell (PERC) technology in PV installations in comparison to the monocrystalline silicon technology (AI-BSF) and the trend towards installing horizontal single-axis tracker systems as opposed to fixed tilt systems.

Solar module prices remain steady amid unchanged market fundamentals In a new weekly update for <b>pv magazine</b>, OPIS, a Dow Jones company, provides a quick look at the main price trends in the global PV industry.

The great untapped potential in non-residential rooftop solar for LMI residents The team used satellite imagery and AI to track unused rooftops with good solar potential, and found that it would bring reduced energy costs to residents.

U.S. solar industry week in review pv magazine USA spotlights news stories of the past week including market trends, project updates, policy changes and more.

CPUC lowers proposed fixed rate charge from $128 to $24.15

After initially saying that Californians could be assessed up to $128 on their electric bills, the commission now proposes a rate of $24.15. regardless of any energy conservation efforts or solar production at home. Along with the fixed charge, electricity rates for generation will be reduced by about 5 to 7 cents per kilowatt hour. CPUC said the move was motivated in part to decouple energy use and grid maintenance costs.

IRS releases updated guidance on energy communities

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and Treasury Department announced additional guidance for determining what a qualified energy community is. Projects in energy communities can qualify for the production and investment tax credit bonuses available within the Inflation Reduction Act, and those bonuses are offered for projects within brownfield, coal and other communities that will face challenges in the transition away from fossil fuels.

The five states with the least amount of solar installed  

PV Intel identifies the solar laggards–North Dakota, West Virginia, Oklahoma, Alaska, and South Dakota–and examines that factors to led to the low rate of solar adoption including policies, electric rates and availability of alternative emission-free electricity from wind, hydro, and nuclear.

Solar and storage to replace coal in New England

In a big win for Sierra Club, The Conservation Law Foundation, and the Environmental Protection Agency, the last two remaining coal-fired plants will be shut down. Both plants are in New Hampshire, and owner Granite Shore Power has committed to using the properties for solar and battery storage.

Hurry up and wait– staggering amount of solar projects queued up for interconnection

By year-end 2023, 1086 GW of solar projects awaited transmission interconnection, along with 503 GW of standalone storage, according to preliminary data from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL). The amount of storage in hybrid projects, such as solar-plus-storage projects, awaiting interconnection at year-end was estimated at 525 GW.

Solar industry calls for domestic content revisions to support U.S. manufacturing With stronger support for the early stages of the process, U.S. module manufacturers would be less dependent on imports from Chinese-owned companies for these materials, according to a recent report from the Solar Energy Manufacturers for America Coalition.

IRENA says solar capacity rose by 345.5 GW in 2023 The International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) says developers installed 345.5 GW of solar throughout the world in 2023. China mainly drove the surge, accounting for nearly three-quarters of all new renewable energy, but IRENA says more equitable growth will be needed to hit 2030 deployment targets.

Solar panel production is struggling to stay clear of forced labor As necessary materials from outside China remain scarce, producers struggle to meet UFLPA compliance.

Rural electric co-ops lend money to customers to improve energy efficiency Some rural electric cooperative utilities allow customers to pay off energy efficiency improvement loans through their utility bills. That contributes to energy efficiency’s role in the renewables transition.

Half of homeowners see solar as a good investment, but 75% said cost is a problem  A survey report from solar design and sales software provider Aurora Solar showed continued customer interest in solar, but a high interest rate environment is dampening that interest.

West Virginia Governor vetoes bill that would double allowable solar project size  House Bill 5528 would have lifted the limit on utility-scale solar project size from 50 MW to 100 MW.

Solar and storage to replace last coal plants in New England  With the planned retirement of Merrimack Station in Bow, N.H. and Schiller Station in Portsmouth, N.H., New England will become coal-free.

Following a settlement between Sierra Club, The Conservation Law Foundation, and the Environmental Protection Agency, New Hampshire’s two coal plants will close and be replaced by a solar plant with battery storage.

Under the settlement agreement, Granite Shore Power (GSP), owner of the two plants, shall cease operation of the Merrimack plant no later than June 1, 2028 and the Schiller plant no later than December 31, 2025.

After a long, but eventually fruitful fight, the Sierra Club estimates that 560 MW of fossil-fuel derived energy is set to go offline. GSP stated that from its “earliest days” the company had planned to transition its fossil-fuel burning facilities to clean energy, and said that the agreement to close the plants will facilitate the creation of “the first-of-their-kind renewable energy parks” in N.H.

The Schiller Station will house a battery energy storage system (BESS), helping to support grid reliability for the Seacoast region of N.H.

GSP said it expects the BESS to store energy generated by wind power that is now being built off the coast of Martha’s Vineyard and in the Gulf of Maine.

The Merrimack Station served as a peaker plant, operating during periods when generation is needed quickly to maintain electrical system stability on the grid, and therefore played a lesser role in the state’s energy infrastructure, GSP said.

The Merrimack Station plant will be replaced by what GSP describes as a “clean energy center” to be built on the 400 acres of land in Bow.

The settlement makes New Hampshire the 16th coal-free state, the 12th to go coal-free since the Beyond Coal campaign launched in 2010. Beyond Coal is a campaign organized by the Sierra Club whose mission is to close all coal plants in the U.S. and replace them with clean energy.

The Merrimack Station in Bow, N.H. was a source of air pollution, with its particulate matter (PM) found in February 2023 to exceed EPA limit by 70%, according to the New Hampshire Department of Environment Services (DES). The Sierra Club noted that a successful smoke stack retest has not been completed in the past year, and DES acknowledges that Merrimack Station is currently not in compliance with EPA standards.

The closure of Merrimack and Schiller is testament to the success of the Sierra Club’s Beyond Coal campaign, noting that these are the 380th and 381st coal plant retirements Sierra Club has championed alongside community and climate allies.

“This historic victory is a testament to the strength and resolve of those who never wavered in the fight for their communities and future,” said Ben Jealous, Sierra Club Executive Director. “The people of New Hampshire and all of New England will soon breathe cleaner air and drink safer water, and I’m incredibly proud to see the region continue to grow as a leader in the clean energy transition.”

From pv magazine Global

Researchers led by Dartmouth College in the United States have identified zintl-phosphide (BaCd2P2) as a potential new absorber material for thin-film solar cells after conducting a high-throughput (HT) computational screening among 40,000 promising inorganic materials.

“Based on its dopability, this material could be used as a p-type absorber layer for pn junction cells or as an intrinsic absorber layer for p-i-n cells,” the research’s corresponding author, Zhenkun Yuan, told pv magazine.

The group selected the inorganic materials from the Materials Project database, which is an open-access database describing material properties that can be used to accelerate the development of a given technology by predicting how new materials, both real and hypothetical, can be potentially utilized.

Through the screening, the scientists initially identified materials that offer a suitable band gap, small effective masses, and promising defect properties. “Among these promising candidates, we select the zintl-phosphide (BaCd₂P₂) and explicitly show that the computed nonradiative recombination rates in BaCd₂P₂ are better than or comparable with those in high-efficiency solar absorbers such as the halide perovskites,” they explained.

After identifying the material, the group found that zintl-phosphide can be very stable both in air and water. “You can put it out for six months and it will stay the same,” added co-author Geoffroy Hautier. “When you don’t have to worry about moisture and air contamination, that significantly reduces your costs.”

By conducting bright photoluminescence (PL) and time-resolved microwave conductivity (TRMC), it also found the material has a potential energy bandgap of 1.45 eV and a carrier lifetime of up to 30 ns.

“All of these results indicate that BaCd₂P₂ is a promising high-performance solar cell absorber with the potential to open a new avenue in PV for an entire family of Zintl AM₂X₂ solar absorbers, where A and M are +2 ions and X is a pnictogen,” the researchers said.

“We won’t have it as a solar panel tomorrow,” added Hautier, “but we think this family of materials is exceptional and worth looking at.”

Their findings were presented in the paper “Discovery of the Zintl-phosphide BaCd₂P₂ as a long carrier lifetime and stable solar absorber,” published in Joule.

The latest New England Independent System Operator (ISO-NE) capacity auction for 2027-28 concluded with coal failing to secure a spot, while solar, storage and wind all increased their market share.

ISO-NE announced that approximately 950 individual energy resources successfully bid to provide capacity if needed. Out of these, 603 were solar power or solar-plus-storage facilities, accounting for 16.6 GW of the total 31.5 GW of capacity.

The size of the sources ranged from 7 kW to 1.2 GW. The smallest facility, a 7 kW solar power plant named “Grasshopper 142 Blackstone,” is located in southeast Massachusetts. The largest solar plant, Three Corners Solar, which is located in Maine, secured a bid for 77.1 MW of capacity.

Facilities receive a monthly payment based on their available kWac capacity. The auction’s preliminary price is $3.58/kW per month, 38% higher than last year’s bid, but similar to bids placed five years ago.

The 7 kW Grasshopper solar facility bid that it could guarantee 2.462 kWac of capacity, earning a monthly payment of $8.81 and an annual total of $105. The facility must rebid next year. The Three Corners Solar facility, bid for its full capacity of 77.1 MWac but only for the summer period from June to September. It will earn $276,018 for each month and $828,054 for the summer season.

In 2019, Sunrun secured capacity payments for a distributed solar and storage portfolio for the first time, with delivery beginning under the contract in fall 2022. Since this initial bid, known as “FCA 13,” Sunrun has consistently secured contracts each year. Most recently, they won with three portfolios, totaling 5.67 MW of capacity.

The ISO noted that 1.7 GW of energy storage won bids, with 700 MW of those being new facilities this year. Energy storage first won capacity bids in the 2019 auction with 5 MW of capacity.

Offshore wind had a big moment with Vineyard Wind 1, an ~800 MW facility nearing completion, securing capacity payments on its first bid. The facility clinched two blocks: a 146 MW/50 MW winter/summer capacity and a larger 347 MW/185 MW block. Notably, wind farms typically offered more capacity in winter, whereas solar installations mainly provided value in summer or had reduced winter capacity when paired with energy storage.

The largest resource in New England to win capacity was the Seabrook Nuclear Power Plant in New Hampshire, which secured 1.25 GW of capacity.

The Merrimack Generation Station in Bow, New Hampshire, a 482 MW coal plant that had been winning capacity bids until 2023, failed again to win any bids. The plant’s last payments of $785,000 a month will end with the closure of the 2025-2026 capacity season. According to the plant owners, the only financial path forward is to rely on revenue generated from supplying electricity during winter peak demand periods.

There are no other coal facilities currently operating in New England. However, wholesale electricity emissions in the region have not decreased for several years. This is because natural gas still dominates the grid, representing 46% of generation. Additionally, the retirement of multiple nuclear facilities has contributed to this trend.

Tribal solar on the rise Native American lands boast serious PV potential in the United States but getting projects off the ground hasn‘t always been easy. Different tribes are willing to take power generation into their own hands and the landscape could be shifting, thanks to funding from the US Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) and other programs.

Fully printable flexible perovskite solar cell achieves 17.6% efficiency Developed by scientists in Canada, the 0.049 cm2 solar cell was built in ambient air fabricationand with a reactant known as phenyltrimethylammonium chloride (PTACl). It achieved an open-circuit voltage of 0.95 V, a short-circuit current density of 23 mA cm−2, and a fill factor of 80%.

First Solar could have $5 billion impact on U.S. economy by 2026 A study commissioned by First Solar analyzed the company’s actual and forecast U.S. spending in 2023 and 2026 when the company expects to have 14 GW of annual nameplate capacity across Alabama, Louisiana, and Ohio.

California needs 10 GW of solar deployment in five years, 57.5 GW of new solar added by 2045 For context, the state has about 43GW installed cumulatively to date, according to SEIA. The state’s new 2035 electricity emissions goals include 19 GW of new solar power, 20.6 GW of new wind and 15.7 GW of new battery power.

Construction begins on largest utility-owned solar project in New Hampshire ReVision Energy is building the 4.9 MW solar project on 36 acres of vacant land in Kingston, New Hampshire.

Arizona approves “discriminatory” charge on rooftop solar customers The Arizona Corporation Commission approved a request from utility APS to raise rates and add a punitive charge to rooftop solar customers.

Fire department nets 40% tax credit and $18,000 state rebate for rooftop solar A fire station in Superior, Wisconsin will save on energy bills and cut emissions with solar.

Unitil Corporation, a public utility holding company with operations in three New England states, began site work on a 4.9 MW solar project in Kingston, N.H. When complete in 2025, it will be the largest utility-owned solar in New Hampshire. The first utility-owned solar plant is a 2.59 MW in Moultonborough, owned by New Hampshire Electric Cooperative.

The Kingston solar project will include 11,232 Qcells solar modules mounted on Terrasmart single-axis trackers with an east-west rotation. The installation will include approximately 40 Chint Power Systems’ string inverters, and the electricity generated by the solar plant will be delivered directly into Unitil’s electric distribution system.

The plant is expected to generate approximately 9.7 million kilowatt hours of energy in its first year of service and is expected to average 8.6 million kilowatt hours annually over its projected 40-year lifespan.

Unitil chose New Hampshire-based ReVision Energy based in Brentwood, N.H. as its engineering, procurement and construction contractor for the solar array.

“The new array reflects Unitil’s long-term goals of addressing the region’s climate objectives in a way that’s cost-effective, sustainable, and provides direct benefits to all customers,” said Alex  O’Meara, external affairs director at Unitil. “We look forward to partnering on this project with ReVision Energy, which brings with it 20 years of award-winning experience in the solar industry here in New England.”

The Kingston project was approved by the New Hampshire Public Utilities Commission in May 2023 and has since received all required local, state and federal permits. Under New Hampshire law, utilities can invest in renewable generation of up to 6% of their total distribution peak load, which provides Unitil the opportunity to develop as much as 18 MW of renewables.

“With this array, Unitil will provide substantial savings for ratepayers, generate employment opportunities within the community, and significantly curb carbon emissions,” said Dan Weeks, vice president of business development at ReVision Energy. “

While energy storage initially will not be part of the Kingston site, it has been designed for solar. A spokesperson told pv magazine USA that Unitil continues to evaluate the cost and benefits of storage to ensure the addition of storage provides net benefits to customers.

This article was amended on Feb. 27, 2024 to state that the Kingston plant is the largest utility owned, but not the first.

The Solar Energy Industries Association estimates that homeowners spend $25,000 installing residential solar systems, so it makes sense that more buyers are looking to purchase properties with solar panels already retrofitted. However, according to findings published in MarketWatch, even these homes can come at a premium.

To find out which regions of the U.S. have the highest number of solar-powered homes for sale per 100,000 people and how much prospective buyers are paying for solar-powered residences across the country, MarketWatch searched Zillow. Using the keyword “solar,” they assessed how many relevant home listings popped up in specific states and cities relative to the local population.

MarketWatch used each listing’s page views and price details to calculate the average interest in the property and determine how much more a buyer needs to pay for a solar-powered home:  

• In terms of cities, Las Vegas had the highest number of solar-powered homes for sale in the U.S. (287), while Goodyear, Ariz., had the highest number of solar-powered homes for sale per 100,000 people (58).
• Regarding states, California and Florida had the most solar-powered homes on the market at 6,014 residences and 2,852 residences, respectively. Hawaii and Nevada had the highest number of homes for sale per 100,000 people at 23 and 20 residences, respectively. 
• Regarding interest in purchasing a solar home, New Hampshire was the state with the highest number of views of solar home per day at 1,799. Irvine, Calif., attracted the highest number of views per day at 2,188. 
• For price, buyers of solar-powered homes in Kansas paid the highest premium in the country, at 91.15%. On the low end, buyers in California had a premium of 4.13%

MarketWatch attributes the high number of solar homes on the market in Las Vegas to the rapid growth rate of solar-powered developments in that area. Goodyear, Ariz., ranked high due to receiving 300 days of sunshine, making it ideal for solar, MarketWatch reports.

California had the highest number of solar-powered homes for sale at 6,014 listings, which MarketWatch also attributes to its regular exposure to the sun. Hawaii boasted the highest number of solar-powered homes on the market relative to the people at 23 listings per 100,000. The report authors state this is because its electricity costs are the highest in the nation.

The top nine U.S. cities that had the most interest in purchasing a solar-powered home were in California. These include properties in Irvine, Calif., which had 2,188 views per day, followed by Corona Calif., at 2,160 views and San Diego, Calif., at 2,151 views. MarketWatch states this is partly because of the rising costs of utilities in fast-growing cities. 

According to the study, buyers in Arkansas had the highest premium (91.5%) when purchasing a solar-powered home. Buyers in California pay an average 4.13% price premium on their solar-powered home, the lowest in the country. 

The New Hampshire Department of Energy has submitted a request for a $70 million federal grant to expand community solar for low-income residents in the state, the Energy News Network reports..

The grant request was filed with the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Solar For All competitive grant program. The program set aside $7 billion to increase solar access for people living in low-income communities across the U.S. Up to 60 grants will be rewarded under the program.

Community solar involves customers subscribing to a portion of an on-site or off-site solar facility’s generating capacity, receiving credit on their traditional utility bills for the electricity produced by the system. The Department of Energy said community solar customers can expect to see an average of 10% to 20% savings on their utility bill. It offers customers who do are not able to install solar on their rooftop another pathway toward adopting solar.

New Hampshire created regulatory pathways for community solar in 2013, but project size limits and limited economic viability have prevented the market from taking off, said Energy News Network. The Solar For All grant funds are expected to improve the economic benefits while assisting with customer acquisition.

Under the proposal, the program would fund a portion of the solar project if most of the power generated benefits low-income households. It would also set aside funds for the development of low-income housing, administered by New Hampshire Housing.

The grant proposal addresses an issue in solar adoption for renters called the “split incentive.” Landlords have little motivation to put up capital for solar panel installations if their tenants pay their own electricity bills. New Hampshire’s proposal would change this structure by having landlords take over tenant utility bills, roll the costs into rent, and make discounts for tenants based on the solar savings.

“The Solar for All proposal takes a huge step in moving things in a more positive direction,” Sam Evans-Brown, executive director of Clean Energy New Hampshire told Energy News Network. “It’s giving landlords a carrot to figure this out.”

EPA is expected to announce grant recipients in March 2024, with funds beginning to roll out in 2025.

This article was amended to add Energy News Network as the original source.

Form Energy, a manufacturer of a 100-hour iron-air battery, believes that if New England adopts a ‘fossil-free by 2050’ policy, their energy storage system could replace a massive 111.4 GW of solar capacity and circumvent the need for 80.3 GW of less than 10-hour lithium-ion energy storage. The company further contends that its batteries are well-suited to address the decreased productivity of offshore wind during winter lulls, effectively adding 14.4 GW of offshore wind capacity and helping phase out 15.4 GW of fossil fuel dependence.

The product is touted for its cost benefits, delivering capacity at an approximate $20/kWh – a stark contrast to the $176/kWh of a 6-hour lithium-ion solution (one of many storage products the document modeled). This value proposition is detailed in their recent white paper, “Clean, Reliable, Affordable: The Value of Multi-Day Storage in New England.”

According to Form Energy’s modeling, by harnessing solar energy more judiciously, New England could realize savings of around $115 billion. An additional $80 billion in savings is projected on the lithium-ion storage front, totaling an estimated $190 billion.

As New England contemplates a transition to a ‘fossil-free by 2050’ framework, the elimination of fossil fuels would pivot their energy dependence to renewables. Current cost modeling suggests that overbuilding renewables and curtailing as needed is more affordable than installing standard 4 and 6-hour lithium-ion backups when it comes to covering the three day winter time wind power lulls that must be considered.

By design, overbuilding renewables results in significant curtailment. In the heavily oversized model, a mere 79% of New England’s offshore wind and 43% of its solar potential are exploited. With Form Energy’s approach, these figures could catapult to 95% and 84% respectively, slashing curtailment by 83%.

While roughly $190 billion in hardware is saved, the system requires the installation of $92 billion of other equipment – including Form Energy’s own technology. The expansion of offshore wind facilities would require an added $29.1 billion (at $2,021/kW), medium-range storage is estimated at $16.1 billion (at $3,232 per kW), and Form Energy’s 23.4 GW/2.34 TWh setup would cost around $46.8 billion (at $2,150 per kW).

It’s worth noting that although Form Energy’s product does greatly increase system efficiency, its round-trip efficiency is under 50%, in contrast to lithium-ion’s 85%.

Factoring in these expenses, net hardware savings hover around the $100 billion mark. Moreover, the company notes that offsetting 111 GW of solar could conserve nearly 300,000 acres of New England’s land.

On the other hand, the Massachusetts Department of Energy Resources suggests that the energy produced by those 300,000 acres of solar could be matched in capacity by the deployment of as much as 152 GW of “highly suitable” rooftop solar in Massachusetts alone.

Beyond the $100 billion in projected savings, a crucial takeaway is Form Energy’s adherence to a “No Fossil Fuel” system. Presently, New England is without a unified regional policy, with only some progressive states like Massachusetts targeting a “Net Zero” status by 2050.

A prevailing concern for New England’s wind energy is its unpredictability. Despite offshore wind resources in New England demonstrating an impressive winter capacity factor of 60%, there are stretches with virtually zero production, sometimes lasting several days.

To address this, Form Energy analyzed two decades of offshore wind data from ISO New England, the regional power grid manager. The data suggests that pairing every MW of offshore wind with 0.56 MW and 30-34 MWh of energy storage would capably handle offshore wind interruptions, even those at the 90th to 95th severity percentile.

Numerous energy storage alternatives could fit this bill, but Form Energy’s solution stands out. It’s projected to be nearly 80% more affordable than lithium-ion counterparts, carries a minimal fire risk, and boasts over double the longevity, making it an attractive proposition for the region’s energy future.

Senate votes to resume solar tariffs, threatening clean energy supply  The United States Senate voted to overturn President Biden’s two-year pause on tariffing solar goods shipped from four Southeast Asian nations responsible for 80% of solar supply. Biden is expected to veto the resolution.

California utilities commission sued for gouging rooftop solar payments  Three leading environmental groups have filed a petition to the California Court of Appeals to review the state’s solar net energy metering cuts.

New Hampshire utility offers dynamic rates for distributed storage exports An owner of an 8.6 kW PV system and eligible battery system could earn up to $1700 per year in credits under a New Hampshire utility’s dynamic rate program. Certain standalone storage systems, electric vehicles, and EV chargers are also eligible.

Stanley Black & Decker 100% renewable energy powered in Kentucky A 4.3 MW solar project will power the company’s on-site production facility, with excess going to the state.

RFP alert: Tribal solar accelerator seeks projects  An accelerator fund for tribal authorities that includes 65 tribes and over 120 tribal individuals will award grants of up to $200,000 for solar projects situated on tribal authority land, and $50,000 grants per year for tribal energy plan proposals.

Solar Earnings Recap: SunPower, Sunrun and SolarEdge  pv magazine USA’s recap of notable upstream solar, integrated solar, finance and rooftop installers that reported quarterly or fiscal year earnings over the last week.

Average silver price expected to drop 2% to $21.30 per ounce this year  The U.S. Silver Institute’s “World Silver Survey 2022” report shows that the price of the metal will fall slightly this year despite increasing demand from the PV industry.

Florida resort owner deploys 1.51 MW of solar arrays Optimus Energy installed four solar arrays at resorts located in Kissimmee (760 kW), Lake Buena Vista (147 kW), Clearwater (205 kW) and Palm Coast, Fla. (402 kW).

The New Hampshire Electric Cooperative (NHEC) has launched a Transactive Energy Rate Pilot Program for its customers who own eligible battery storage systems, which may be paired with solar, or eligible electric vehicles (EVs) or EV chargers. Participating customers will pay for electricity used by eligible devices at 24 hourly rates set one day ahead, and may export electricity from those devices later, when hourly rates are higher.

Currently eligible devices, the utility said, are:

• Generac’s PwrCell battery system, which may be combined with solar;
• Either of two bidirectional EV chargers from Fermata Energy, “currently compatible with Nissan LEAF only;”
• Certain General Motors (GM) electric vehicles—the 2016 – 2019 Chevrolet Volt and the 2017 – 2021 Chevrolet Bolt.

The utility added that the FLO Home X5 unidirectional EV charger is expected to be eligible soon.

Nissan previously said that use of the Fermata Energy FE-15 bi-directional charger will not impact the Nissan LEAF’s battery warranty. NHEC projected that New Hampshire’s Plymouth State University, which leased two new Nissan LEAFs and connected them to two Fermata Energy chargers, will earn $4000 per year in credits for each vehicle.

GM expects to launch an enrollment process for owners of Chevrolet EVs later this month, while NHEC said it expects that GM’s Chevy Silverado and other GM models will become eligible during the pilot program.

The pilot program is limited to 50 of the utility’s 85,000 customers, and will run for six months “so we can fine tune the member experience before increasing participation,” said David Erickson, NHEC’s director of access and distributed resources.

The cooperative utility expects that participating members will typically work with a third-party aggregator to manage their device. The utility says that aggregators that have “successfully integrated devices” with the Transactive Energy Rate system to date are Generac, Fermata Energy and General Motors. The utility said it is “actively seeking” additional aggregators to help its members participate in the pilot program.

Transactive energy rates are set one day ahead, as shown in the above image from a utility slide deck. Each day the utility sends the next day’s 24 hourly price signals to registered devices, to “inform, not control,” it said.

The hourly price signals, or rates, are the same as NHEC’s full “avoided cost” rate, said Erickson. “This allows NHEC to charge our members (or credit those that provide energy services) at the same rates that we would be purchasing from our suppliers.” He added that costs related to the NHEC distribution system are not reflected in the rates.

The OpenADR Alliance said that NHEC chose OpenADR as a communication protocol between the eligible devices and its billing system. The utility selected Bellawatt to develop the software for the project.

The utility provided the following example of how a customer with 27 kWh of battery storage might earn $28.37 of credit in one day by purchasing electricity at low prices in the middle of the night, and selling electricity at high prices in the late afternoon.

The utility estimated that an 8.6 kW PV system with eligible battery system enrolled in the transactive energy rates program could earn a customer $1700 per year in credits if the renewable energy certificates were sold to the utility. An eligible 5 kW home battery system could earn a customer $1200 per year in credits, the utility said.

In California, demand flexibility enabled by dynamic rates is seen as a way to integrate more renewable generation into the grid, and achieve lower rates for customers. Flexible supply from batteries at times of peak demand can also contribute to a reduced need for peak capacity and lower rates.

Proposed legislation in California would require new EVs sold in the state after 2026 to have not only vehicle to grid but “vehicle to everything” capabilities.

New Hampshire Electric Cooperative serves 85,000 homes and businesses in 118 communities. It is the state’s largest cooperative utility and its second-largest utility.

Silicon Valley Bank financed 62% of community solar Silicon Valley Bank, one of the nation’s largest, was closed by the FDIC on Thursday night after $42 billion in withdrawals occurred after a massive stock drop due to ongoing losses in the bond market.

Tesla’s Investor Day: Ramping up the Megapack business The electric vehicle and storage manufacturer shared insight into its Megapack energy storage business and the Megapack XL, the stationary battery storage product that Tesla says has the highest energy density on the market.

Semi-transparent organic photovoltaics for greenhouse applications  Scientists from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), have used an antioxidant known as L-glutathione as an interlayer in an organic PV cell to prevent other materials from oxidizing. The cell has an efficiency of 13.5% and an average visible transmittance of 21.5%. The researchers said it is suitable for applications in solar greenhouses.

Community Power Coalition of New Hampshire announces electricity rates  Electric customers in 10 towns to save at least 22% on electricity supply rates. Through aggregation, the towns have greater purchasing power than individuals buying power on their own.

50 GW of solar and storage for TVA by 2035, plus EVs could save customers money A clean energy plan for TVA sponsored by the Center for Biological Diversity and GridLab could save customers about $200 billion through 2050. It calls for almost four times more solar by 2035 than the maximum amount TVA was considering last year.

Solar on U.S. houses of worship triples relative market share of other non-residential buildings  Houses of Worship represent only 0.6% of all non-residential buildings, but account for nearly 2% of solar installations on such buildings. These locations offer a unique opportunity to promote solar and a blueprint for equitable solar deployment in communities across the country.

Agrivoltaics market valued at $9.3 billion The agrivoltaics market is pegged at a 10.1% annual growth rate. Industry constituents are convening at the inaugural Solar Farm Summit this week in Rosemont, Ill.

Nine-year old Texas solar farm gets an upgrade  A lot has changed in tracker technology in the past decade, so in upgrading its Alamo plants, OCI Solar Power completely replaced the old tracker with a new state-of-the-art system, all while keeping the plant energized.

The Community Power Coalition of New Hampshire (CPCNH) announced its base electric rate of 15.8 ¢ per kilowatt-hour, which starting in May 2023 will generate $5.8 million of dollars in savings for electric customers in 10 New Hampshire communities in the first three months alone. Community power was enabled by the New Hampshire legislature in 2019, now it is launching with 10 communities signed on.

Community power, also called community choice aggregation (CCA), allows towns to procure power on behalf of its residents, businesses and municipal accounts from an alternative supplier. Transmission and distribution services are still provided by the local utility provider. By aggregating demand, towns are able to negotiate better rates with competitive suppliers and choose cleaner energy sources. Many states have seen electric rates soar in recent months, and many towns are turning to community power as a way to have more local control over electricity sources (such as choosing more renewable energy), and lower or stable elecrtricity rates.

New Hampshire is just one of eleven states in the country to have authorized community power, with the other states being California, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Rhode Island, and Virginia.

CPCNH provides service to New Hampshire communities served by three utilities, and it reports that its base rate beats the electric rates set by all three entities: 22% less than Eversource’s energy supply rate; 28% less than Liberty Utilities; and 39% less than Until. The lower prices are possible because, through aggregation, the town is buying electricity for a group, which has greater purchasing power than an individual acting alone. For example, the National Renewable Energy Lab showed in a solar cost benchmark study the connection between scale and prices. The study showed that procuring 100 MW of solar instead of 10 MW can reduce development costs per watt by 16%.

“Innovation is central to the mission of Community Power,” said Clifton Below, CPCNH board chair, “our Coalition power agency is equipped to build community-scale renewable energy projects that directly benefit our cities and towns for the long-term, and to push other innovations that empower customers with distributed energy resources.”

Community power must be voted on in each town that is interested in its benefits, which for many towns can be a process that takes years. To date, 10 N.H. towns have launched community power programs including: Enfield, Exeter, Hanover, Harrisville, Lebanon, Nashua, Peterborough, Plainfield, Rye, and Walpole. In May the Coalition takes over as the default electricity provder for these communities,

Many more New Hampshire towns and cities have begun the process to launch their own programs in the coming months and years. A total of 30 communities have already voted to join the Community Power Coalition and are currently in the process of launching their own Community Power Programs.

“A key value of the Coalition is the ability to manage a portfolio of energy resources and hedge risk, and for communities to control and adjust rates over time to ensure they can maintain discounts relative to utility pricing. The benefits of Community Power are made possible by a combination of local and state leadership working together to ensure that every city and town in New Hampshire has the opportunity to chart a better energy future for their community” concluded Henry Herndon, consultant to CPCNH.

Energy customers in Nashua, N.H. are expected to save $2.6 million in the first three months of Nashua Community Power service, according to the CPCNH.

“Nashua is proud to be among the first ten communities that are charting a new path when it comes to where we get our energy,” said Nashua Mayor Jim Donchess. “Community Power Coalition is a brand new institution that gives Nashua and other communities the ability to control price volatility in the short- and long-term, and the tools to accelerate the transition to a more economically and environmentally sustainable energy system.”

Also read 50 states of solar incentives: New Hampshire

As we learned in 2022, the price of natural gas in Germany is a major influence on residential solar power sales in the United States. And due to the unpredictable nature of these prices, solar sales people choosing which escalators to put into their proposals would be wise to consult with history.

There is significant evidence that the war in Europe had been driving residential solar sales in both the United States and Europe. Electricity prices across the United States increased in part due to the war. This was partially enabled by the newly expanding natural gas export market, which has exposed U.S. consumers to more expensive international pricing.

Ohm Analytics shared data with pv magazine USA that shows that some of the states with the highest rates of electricity price increases – Massachusetts and New Hampshire – also had some of the largest growth in solar installations. New Hampshire’s electricity supply rates doubled, and saw a 380% increase in residential solar demand.

For now, the natural gas price increases of several hundred percent have burned out, challenging the salespeople who do the financial modeling of solar proposals with an increasingly volatile new reality.

The U.S. Department of Energy’s Energy Information Administration (EIA) expects that gas usage in the first quarter of 2023 will be the lowest it’s been since 2018, due to warmer weather this winter. This, along with the international gas market calming, has led the EIA to project that the price of wholesale natural gas will fall to roughly half of the average price paid in 2022. 

Some electricity generators have started adjusting their pricing. Rhode Island Energy says they may drop the supply side prices of electricity more than 25% for residential customers, along with small and mid-sized commercial customers, starting April 1, 2023. This announcement follows the Massachusetts Public Utility Commission’s approval of winter gas price decreases in early February.

According to U.S. Government data, the average US electricity pricing increased by 14% in 2022.

This whipsaw will affect some solar customers differently. For instance, the pricing changes are affecting how people enroll in the Massachusetts SMART solar program. The SMART program pays out incentives based on a project’s return on investment and the price of electricity. Higher electricity prices produce better returns, and reduce the incentive.

In the Eversource utility region of the south coast of Massachusetts, the incentive is under 2 cents per kilowatt hour, due to the high winter electricity pricing. This somewhat low incentive led some customers to forgo the SMART program and connect without incentives due to fewer hardware requirements and other regional incentives. However, when the price of electricity in Massachusetts drops, and the incentive increases, customers who switched from the SMART program to a pure install will miss out on ten years of increased incentives.

In contrast to dropping electricity prices, there are still a few regions where pricing continues to increase. Florida and California, for example, are both seeking rate increases. Florida is seeking to cover their energy procurement price increases from 2022, while California’s strange winter season drove heavy demand for gas. We should expect to see the rates in these regions fall at some point later this year.

With a variety of market outcomes possible, anyone signing up for solar power right now should take heed of their escalators and starting electricity rates. A number of residential installation companies have been sued for electricity price escalators in their contracts that outpaced the market. For instance, Vivint was sued by the State of New Mexico for a seemingly reasonable 2.9% electricity escalator. That escalator would likely have gone unnoticed if electricity prices had increased through the end of the 2010s, as they had in the prior decade.

Going forward, bullish escalators might still be the right choice, but long term natural gas pricing presents a dilemma. Almost all demand growth for the fuel in the United States has been a direct result of increased natural gas exports. Exports were clearly the reason for price increases in 2022. And after becoming the world’s top exporter of natural gas in 2022, the United States is expected to continue increasing exports of the fuel.

With ongoing warfare, continued global growth in energy demand, and an energy transition underway, the only thing we can expect is change.

Luminia, a San Diego, Calif.-based commercial solar developer, signed an agreement to acquire the development company behind the New Hampshire Solar Garden, a 15 MW  community solar project portfolio the two companies constructed in 2022.

By acquiring substantially all of the assets of Portsmouth, N.H.-based NHSolarGarden.com LLC, Luminia picks up a community solar portfolio totaling more than 218 MW of projects.  The company’s founder Andrew Kellar will join Luminia as vice president, development, as part of the transaction.

“New Hampshire Solar Garden has been an incredible partner and influential leader in establishing successful community solar projects across the Northeast,” said David Field, chief executive officer of Luminia. “As we continue to scale our community solar business, we are thrilled to welcome Andrew to our team to lead our internal origination strategy – directly and in partnership with co-development partners and strategic off-takers in key markets.”

To date the New Hampshire company has installed projects across New England, New York and New Jersey. The developer was the first to offer community solar offtake solutions in New Hampshire at a large scale. Its founder was instrumental in convincing municipalities to serve as offtake backstops for community solar assets, spearheading financing and fostering innovation in the region.

Besides its Northeast project pipeline, the company also has 140 MW of development assets for installation in Puerto Rico, for which this week the Department of Energy announced $1 billion in federal funding to procure new residential, community solar and energy storage projects across the island in the coming years.

“Having been part of the Northeast community solar development since its inception more than a decade ago, I am excited to share my perspective and build credibility with Luminia’s developer partners,” said Kellar. “Having been on the developer side, I know first-hand how Luminia allowed me to spend the majority of my day doing what I love, with the platform and people-support to tackle the financial and legal aspects of deals that occupied so much of my former capacity.”

Community solar is a growing market segment within the solar industry, with support from federal policies including the Biden Administration and the Department of Energy’s community solar pilot programs, and the Inflation Reduction Act’s ten-year, 30% ITC extension.

Luminia’s acquisition of New Hampshire Solar Garden will help support the growing demand for new community solar projects by providing financing and technology solutions for the deployment of community solar projects at a larger scale.

Formed in 2019, Luminia closed 2022 with over $2.5 billion in commercial solar financing requests across the U.S., representing close to 200 MW of commercial solar projects, with a development pipeline of 600 MW of additional projects.

In 2022, Luminia (formerly SD Renewables), offered financing solutions that catered to commercial property owners across 36 states. Its solutions range from multi-family and industrial real estate investment trust (REIT) portfolios to private education institutions and agricultural projects.

The company enables property owners to gain access to a range of sustainability and asset value improvements, such as EV charging infrastructure and water conservation improvements. The projects it supports vary in size and scope to meet state and municipal requirements, with an average project size of 9.5 MW. The five key markets for the company are Massachusetts, New York, Maine, New Hampshire and New Jersey.

“By eliminating the financing barriers that once hindered commercial solar progress, we are experiencing explosive demand from our top rated solar partners, especially in the burgeoning community solar space,” said David Field, chief executive officer and co-founder of Luminia.

Luminia’s solution was recently launched on Energy Toolbase’s  ETB Developer platform, which helps developers to access power purchase agreement quotes and additional financing options that are intended to match their customers’ needs.

Growatt releases new battery for rooftop solar applications  Growatt’s new APX HV cobalt-free lithium iron phosphate (LFP) battery has a storage capacity of 5 kWh and a nominal voltage of 650 V.

GameChange Solar expands its manufacturing footprint in the U.S.  The racking and tracking specialist will have manufacturing facilities in eight states.

Let California farmers opt in to dynamic pricing of electricity, says trade group  A pilot project that enables farmers to shift irrigation pumping to hours with low-cost electricity has saved them money, and in theory has reduced renewables curtailment. The pilot should be expanded to reach farmers statewide, said CalCCA.

Christmas tree farm in Bethlehem, NH goes solar  The Rocks tree farm will be 100% powered by an 86.4 kW solar array.

California cuts rooftop solar net metering: An industry reacts  Reactions to the passage of NEM 3.0., a rulemaking procedure that reduced rooftop solar export payments by 75%.

ADS-TEC Energy to open U.S. EV charging manufacturing facility in Auburn, Alabama  The German company plans to invest $8 million into the new facility which will lead to 180 new jobs.

The U.S. Postal Service to deploy over 66,000 electric vehicles by 2028  Greening its fleet of delivery and other vehicles will cost close to $10 billion, with nearly a third coming from Inflation Reduction Act funding.

Bethlehem, New Hampshire, a small town with a population of 2,500, was named on Christmas day in 1799. Fittingly, the town is known for a Christmas tree farm at The Rocks, a historic property, now owned by the non-profit Society for the Protection of NH Forests (Forest Society).

The Rocks was a working farm in the 19^th century and features exceptional period architecture including an Olmsted-designed garden and a network of woodland trails. The owners’ descendants donated 1,400 acre property to the Forest Society in 1978, which has continued as a Christmas tree farm and educational center, as well as being maintained as a working forest. In 2019, the main building burned to the ground, and since that time The Forest Society has undertaken a major renovation, which includes a new solar array that will bring The Rocks’ facilities close to net zero energy use.

In 2020, The Forest Society engaged ReVision Energy, a large New England solar installer, to install a ground-mount solar array of 180 QCells 480 Watt solar modules. The modules are mounted on an APA racking system, installed in the rocky ground with ground screws. A PowerDash DAS provides monitoring and management. And there are nine single-phase SMA SB 7.0 kW inverters.

The 86.4 kW array, which will be powered up just after the new year, will produce over 100,000 kWh of clean solar energy annually, offsetting 156,000 pounds of carbon, or the equivalent to removing 15 passenger cars from the road.

In addition to the solar array, The Forest Society is having the 1884 Carriage Barn renovated while retaining its historic stone and shingle exterior. The solar array will power new heat pumps, and a geothermal system will be added for heating and cooling. To ensure that the building is as energy efficient as possible, an insulated building envelope will be created on the interior. With the renovation, The Rocks is becoming The Forest Society North, where professional conservation staff who serve the North Country will be based.

The Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) of 2022 brings new emphasis on American-made products that support the transition to clean energy. The IRA includes over $60 billion for domestic manufacturing across the clean energy supply chain, as the country seeks to source from within to support its own supply chain. The U.S.- made solar supply chain is lacking in some core components, including backsheets. However, Endurans Solar is one U.S.-based manufacturer, and the company recently announced plans to expand production.

The HP backsheets are currently manufactured in Nashua, New Hampshire using what the company says is a unique, lamination-free, co-extrusion process that delivers superior protective qualities, based on a novel material stack. The backsheet is made from PFAS-free, fully recyclable polyolefin formulations, and the company reports that it has up to a 30% lower carbon footprint compared to traditional products.

Endurans Solar’s fully recyclable HPO – high-performance polyolefin – backsheets (HP) feature what Endurans says is the strongest core layer in the industry whereas the conductive backsheets (CB) enable high-efficiency and aesthetically pleasing solar modules based on backcontact technology. Unlike laminated backsheet, co-extruded backsheets are thermoplastics and can be fully remelted, reprocessed and reshaped, according to Endurans. More than 20 million modules featuring these UL-certified backsheets have been installed worldwide.

To accommodate the anticipated increasing demand both in the U.S. and overseas, Endurans Solar plans to significantly increase its U.S. backsheet manufacturing capacity. The company is currently finalizing site selection for a new manufacturing plant, with the new line expected to become operational in mid-2023.

“We’re excited that many more millions of solar panels will be manufactured and installed in the U.S. over the coming years, and we look forward to supporting the growth of U.S. solar panel manufacturers with our high-performance, sustainable and made-in-America backsheets,” said Nathan Arbitman, president of Endurans Solar.

Endurans Solar is a wholly owned subsidiary of Worthen Industries, with production facilities across Asia, Europe, in addition to the USA.

If consumers could vary their electricity consumption up or down based on wholesale electricity prices, demand for power would be more flexible. That would help balance variable renewable generation, and yield annual system savings of $33-50 billion nationwide across several scenarios, found a modeling study by Pacific Northwest National Laboratory.

Most of the savings would result from lower capacity payments to hold generation capacity in reserve to meet peak load. Reserve capacity can help prevent steep increases in wholesale energy prices when power demand surges, or many generators go offline. The demand flexibility from real-time pricing would reduce peak load, reducing the need for reserve capacity and the amount of capacity payments, the study found.

Additional savings would result from lower wholesale energy prices and greater consumption of energy when prices are lowest, for instance at times of high renewable generation. Customer electric bills would be reduced by up to 17% for participants, and by 10% for non-participants, in a moderate renewables case.

Pilot studies

Following a pilot study in southern California that showed real-time pricing worked on a distribution circuit, utility SCE has launched a follow-on $2.5 million real-time pricing pilot to help prepare for potential extreme summertime weather. The pilot is open to residential, commercial, and industrial customers with price-responsive end-uses, such as electric vehicle charging, behind-the-meter batteries, and controllable loads, which are equipped with suitable software.

Also in California, state regulators approved a $3.25 million pilot program to offer dynamic hourly pricing for agricultural pumping loads. Regulators directed utility PG&E to implement the pilot in coordination with community choice aggregator Valley Clean Energy, which proposed the pilot. VCE’s agricultural pumping load represents 15% of its annual load.

For a real-time pricing pilot project that will involve residents of three rural communities in Maine and New Hampshire, the US Department of Energy has granted $6.65 million. The Post Road Foundation is leading the project, which involves New Hampshire Electric Cooperative and Efficiency Maine, a quasi-state agency.

“Several jurisdictions currently offer real-time pricing rates,” noted the California Public Utilities Commission, in a decision approving the two California projects. Those include ComEd and Ameren in Illinois for 30,000 customers, Georgia Power for 2,000 customers, and Spain, where it is the default rate for 10 million customers, the commission said.

Sending prices to devices

For its modeling study, researchers at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory modeled the consumption of electricity under real-time pricing in the ERCOT grid region in Texas, which they considered generally representative of the United States, and which enabled them to compare their modeled end-loads to actual end-loads in ERCOT. They then scaled up the results to the United States as a whole.

As shown in the featured image above, the modeled system requires automated, price-responsive device controls, a price-flexibility curve set by each consumer, a service provider that aggregates those consumer choices, and a price-discovery mechanism that determines the price at which the grid objective is achieved. That price is then sent to the device controls, to achieve the grid objective, explained Hayden Reeve, senior technical advisor at PNNL, in a webinar. The modeling used both day-ahead and real-time wholesale energy prices.

The real-time pricing scheme modeled by researchers involved four price elements: the wholesale locational marginal price of electricity, a congestion cost, a distribution cost, and a fixed meter charge. The congestion cost was not modeled as revenue to utilities, but was distributed back to customers.

The modeled scenarios involved two separate deployments of distributed energy resources: flexible loads (HVAC units and residential water heaters) and behind-the-meter batteries. Each type of deployment was evaluated under a business-as-usual case, a moderate renewable generation scenario, and a future higher-renewables scenario that included the deployment of rooftop solar and electric vehicles.

Although ERCOT does not have a capacity market, the researchers modeled a system with a capacity market, in order to represent the entire United StatesMaine where capacity markets are widespread.

Texas has outlawed retail rates indexed to wholesale prices, following surging wholesale prices during the Texas freeze, noted Reeve, during a presentation on the study at a conference organized by IEEE, the global society of engineers. Reeve questioned the state’s use of “a five-minute economic signal to guide multi-decade investments,” and suggested that end users should be protected by capping price signals. “Beyond that, there’s open space in terms of what is the right economic signal to make these multi-decade investment strategies worthwhile to people.”

SolarBuddy eyes US expansion to tackle extreme energy poverty As the charity prepares to move out of “stealth mode” SolarBuddy Founder and CEO, Simon Doble, sat down with pv magazine to discuss how his organization plans to lift as many people as it can from extreme energy poverty, and how expanding to the US will help accelerate that mission.

Headed to New Hampshire on an electric vehicle demand charge holiday! Public Utility Commission discounts demand charges for commercial EV charging locations by 75% in year 1, 50% in year 2, and 25% in year 3.

Pivot Energy closes financing on 90MW solar portfolio Pivot will build, own, and operate the 40 distributed generation solar plants in six different states.

Burns & McDonnell completes 65MW Texas solar project The project employed more than 250 construction professionals during peak work and will will generate enough clean energy to power more than 25,000 residences.

Energy Dome wins BNEF Pioneers 2022 competition for CO2 battery long-duration energy storage technology Energy Dome’s emission-free energy storage method uses carbon dioxide in a closed loop charge/discharge cycle that can store and dispatch renewable energy onto the grid over periods from four to 24 hours.

iSun posts 115% revenue growth in full year 2021 financial results The solar and electric mobility infrastructure developer had a “milestone year.”

In a bid to motivate the construction of electric vehicle charging infrastructure in the state, the Public Utility Commission of New Hampshire has approved a plan from local electric utilities Liberty and Unitil – to offer ‘a temporary demand charge holiday’ for Level 2 & Level 3 electric vehicle charging locations.

The language for the tariffs was found in new legislation from April 7, 2022:

The rate is tailored to serve up to 200 kVA of load, or approximately up to ten Level 2 chargers, each charging at 19.2 kW peak. This rate has three time periods—peak, mid-peak, and off-peak—and has winter and summer rates. All three billing components—distribution, transmission and energy supply—are time varied, and customers must be separately metered. A temporary demand charge holiday is offered for these customers at 75 percent for year 1, 50 percent for year 2, 25 percent for year 3, and ending thereafter.

The language is mostly the same for Level 3 chargers as well, noting that those units range from 50 to 350 kW of peak electrical draw.

State utility Eversource also submitted a more nuanced model that was rejected by the commission as being too complicated. The commission explained that this complex model could potentially backfire, reducing incentives for getting charging infrastructure deployed in the state.

The commission states that there is a challenge in determining how these new assets will affect the system as a whole. The docket shows that the utilities implementing these new rate schedules must report on the costs of new charging stations installed, as well as the impacts those stations will have on ratepayers.

The goal is for the implementation of time of use electricity rates to raise some awareness of peak grid demand periods. If enough people alter their EVs’ charging schedules as a result, the reductions in peak demand may be sufficient to avoid grid upgrade costs, as EV charging broadly expands across the state.

Members of The New England Convenience Store & Energy Marketers Association, Inc. see a great opportunity for their businesses to host these units. However, they point out that “users of publicly accessible charging equipment cannot respond to rate design signals”. The group also states that demand charges, hardware installation, and grid upgrade costs are the primary challenges standing in the way of EV charger implementation.

Duke Energy Florida launches utility-owned “community” solar program Participants will subscribe to a share of the utility’s solar production without having to install panels on their roof.

Batteries help solar connect, pricing still strong  NREL modeled solar-plus-storage as a mitigation tool to limit grid upgrade costs, and finds that for now, it’s still a better investment to build stand-alone solar. However, costs are close.

50 states of solar incentives: New Hampshire The Granite State ranks 40th in solar installations in the country due in part to minimalistic or nonexistent renewable energy policies.

Three year commercial solar project payback period expected through roof mount cost reductions  Installed on S-5! metal roofing mounts, Solar Atmospheres’ 772kW PV solar array and a 1,561kW/3,122kWh Tesla battery storage system, is expected to help the company to meet its varying energy demands.

Senator Markey blasts “minimizing our potential for renewables” or MOPR rule in New England  “It’s time for ISO-New England to get out of the way” of renewables, said Senator Markey. He and Senators Warren and Sanders have asked federal energy regulators to end an anti-renewables rule in New England formally known as the “minimum offer price rule.”

Speeding perovskite solar cell development with machine learning  MIT and Stanford researchers are employing artificial intelligence to test perovskites in pursuit of a commercially viable PV cell manufacturing process.

New York Governor lays out plan to achieve 10GW of distributed solar by 2030  The state’s Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act’s goal is to generate 70% of New York’s electricity from renewables; powering 700,000 additional homes, creating thousands of jobs, with 40% of benefits to low- to moderate-income residents.

NREL’s eight storage projections through 2050  NREL’s final report on the future of storage, drawing from a series of six in-depth studies, presents “key learnings” from across those studies.

The state of New Hampshire has no stated clean energy goals, despite being surrounded by two states with serious commitments. Massachusetts Climate Action Law calls for net-zero by 2050. Maine recently increased its renewable portfolio standard to 80% by 2030 and set a goal of 100% clean energy by 2050. This sharp contrast with its neighbors is a theme that carries through many state policies. However, the state’s clean energy market gets a boost from informed and environmentally aware organizations and individual residents, many of whom have – slowly but surely– pushed through changes in clean energy policies.

High electric bills are the impetus for many New Englanders to go solar, as New England states have some of the highest electric rates in the country. While New Hampshire’s rates are not the highest of the six-state region, they recently experienced a sharp increase. In 2022, for example, according to EIA data, residential electric rates were $21.26, up from $18.93 in 2021. Commercial rates also saw a spike, jumping from $15.40 in 2021 up to $17.54 this year.

Tax credits and exemptions

For those who seize the opportunity to go solar in New Hampshire, the federal Investment Tax Credit (ITC) is currently 26% of system costs but looking for further incentives gets tricky. For starters, there is no property tax exemption offered by the state. Instead, RSA 72: 61-72 permits cities and towns to offer exemptions from local property taxes for certain renewable energy installations, meaning that those who go solar have to check on whether their individual town has issued either a full or partial exemption. Because property taxes are so high in New Hampshire (third highest in the country) exemptions are important for homeowners going solar.

State incentives and credits

The renewable energy fund was created by the legislature (RSA 362F) to help promote renewable energy initiatives in New Hampshire. The fund supports initiatives through rebate and grant programs. Feeding the fund is New Hampshire’s renewable portfolio standard (RPS) requires that 25% of the electric energy supplied in the state must be from renewable fuels and resources. Electricity providers who cannot purchase enough renewable energy or who cannot get it at a reasonable price are allowed to meet this requirement by making an alternative compliance payment to the renewable energy fund.

As for a state rebate for going solar, the State of New Hampshire’s Public Utilities Commission has a Residential Renewable Electric Generation Incentive Program that offers $0.20 per watt, up to a maximum of $1,000 or 30% of the total system cost, whichever is less.

In June of 2017 the New Hampshire PUC updated its net metering policy to enable small customer-generators (100kW or less) to net meter their distributed generation resources. According to the docket, “Those customer-generators will receive monthly excess export credits equal to the value of kWh charges for energy service and transmission service at 100 percent and distribution service at 25 percent, while paying nonbypassable charges, such as the system benefits charge, stranded cost recovery charge, other similar surcharges, and the state electricity consumption tax, on the full amount of their electricity imports from the electric grid”.

NH PUC has a renewable energy certificate (REC) program that uses the regional generation information system of energy certificates administered by ISO-New England and the New England Power Pool.  However, RECs in NH are worth far less than in neighboring states. Recent REC prices have been about $30 per MWh, whereas a REC in Massachusetts is currently valued at about $300 per MWh.

New Hampshire gives a nod toward low- to middle-income residents with the Low-Income Community Solar Act (SB 165) of 2019 that expanded the original Clean Energy Jobs and Opportunity Act. It requires the NH PUC to authorize at least two new LMI community solar projects per utility territory each year starting in 2020. According to the 2020 Cost and Benefits Report, “When operational, the projects, as proposed, will generate an estimated 600,000 kilowatt-hours (kWh) annually and provide direct benefits to 123 LMI households, plus 21 non-LMI households”.

Community power

Senate bill 286 went into effect in 2019, allowing for community power, also known as municipal aggregation, which lets towns provide electricity to its residents and businesses on a competitive basis. Electricity is distributed through one of the four traditional utilities in NH– Eversource, Liberty Utilities, NH Electric Cooperative, and Unitil—and towns may choose to purchase power generated by solar, wind, or other attributes. Towns may also choose to construct a local energy project to provide the power to its Community Power program.

Six towns in New Hampshire have committed to the Sierra Club’s Ready for 100 campaign, a movement that aims to get towns to commit 100% clean, renewable energy. Hanover was the first town in the country to sign on, committing in 2017 to a goal of powering the entire community with 100% renewable energy for electricity by 2030 (heat & transportation by 2050).

Solar opportunity

With a total of only 164.8MW of solar installed in the state, New Hampshire is currently ranked 40^th in the country for installed solar (down from 36^th last year), and only 1.8% of the state’s electricity currently comes from solar.

The growth projection is even more bleak with only 427MW projected over the next five years, or a ranking of 42^nd in the country. Let’s say that another way: Only eight states are expected to install less solar than New Hampshire through 2028. There are currently about 55 solar companies in New Hampshire, with a total of approximately 1,000 jobs in the industry.

To find out how to advance solar in New Hampshire and seize the clean energy opportunity, pv magazine spoke with Sam Evans-Brown, executive director of Clean Energy New Hampshire, a non-profit that provides services and resources to support the clean energy and tech communities. Evans-Brown indicated that step one in advancing clean energy in NH would be to expand the renewable portfolio standard. “We’ll keep trying to get policy wins every year and those will necessarily for a while be small, but with small incremental steps, we’ll get it done,” he said. For many years the largest solar arrays in the state were 1 and 2MW facilities, the most recent of which is own by the New Hampshire Electric Coop and located in Moultonborough. The good news is that the tide may be turning, with a few much larger facilities planned in the state. For example, the Chariot Solar 50MW project was recently approved to be built by NextEra Energy on an approximately 200-acre site in Hinsdale, New Hampshire, and expected to be operational next year.

This is the third article in the 50 states of solar incentives series, which began with Maine and then took a look at Connecticut.

In addition to the 26% federal solar investment tax credit, many states offer incentives for going solar, with a wide variance in structure and rates paid to homeowners attaching solar to their homes.

Here, pv magazine takes a look at the six New England states, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Hampshire, Vermont, and Maine, and the current incentives they offer:

Rhode Island

Net metering: Homeowners’ excess solar generation can be fed back to the grid in exchange for credits on utility bills. Rhode Island’s Renewable Energy Growth plan guarantees enrolled customers will receive $0.2965 per kWh exported for 15 years.

Property tax exemption: Customer-owned solar panels may raise the value of the home, but they do not increase property taxes.

Sales tax exemption: Solar is exempt from Rhode Island’s 7% sales tax rate.

CommerceRI Renewable Energy Fund grant: This is a capacity-based payment of $0.85 per watt, with a maximum of $7,000. Average systems generally pay about $4,000-$5,000.

Massachusetts

Solar Massachusetts Renewable Target (SMART) Program: A declining-block incentive program with 3.2 GW cap for total projects receiving incentives. As more projects apply for the incentive, it moves through tiers of declining values. Customers receive significant incentive rate adders for including energy storage or agreeing to participate in peak-demand load shifting programs. Eligible for customers of National Grid, Eversource, and Unitil only.

Residential Energy Credit: A credit worth up to 15% of the solar array, capped at $1,000.

Sales and property tax exemptions: Customers do not pay the Massachusetts 6.25% sales tax, and do not pay property tax for the increase of home value solar creates.

Net metering: customers of National Grid, Eversource, Unitil are eligible for net metering. Customers can use excess generation to offset utility bills, or they can transfer credits to another participating account within the ISO-NE electrical grid.

Connecticut

Residential Solar Investment Rebate Program: Connecticut Green Bank offers $0.463 per watt of solar installed. Homeowners often receive more than $2,000 in savings through this program.

Energy Conservation Loan Program: Low-to-no interest loans can be taken from the Connecticut state government. Rates land between 0-6% for up to $25,000 and 10 years.

Net metering: Customers are eligible to send excess solar generation to the grid for credit on utility bills. All projects under 2 MW can qualify for net metering.

Sales and property tax exemptions: Homeowners avoid the 6.35% sales tax, and do not pay property taxes for solar.

New Hampshire

Net metering: Customers of Eversource, Liberty Utilities, New Hampshire Electric Cooperative and Unitil are eligible to export excess solar generation in exchange for utility bill credits.

Property tax exemption: New Hampshire residents, in select counties, avoid increased property taxes due to solar. NH does not have sales tax.

Renewable Energy Generation Incentive Program: Projects 10 kW or less can receive credit worth either $0.20 per watt, up to $1,000, or half the cost of their residential solar system.

Vermont

Property and sales tax exemptions: Vermont homeowners do not pay sales tax or property tax for solar.

Net metering: Major utility Green Mountain Power offers $0.1484 per kWh for exported solar energy, less than 100% of the retail price of power in their territory. There is an upfront cost of $110 to add a net meter, and all credits must be used within 12 months.

Green Mountain Power Bring Your Own Device: Customers can receive up to $10,500 towards the purchase of a home battery attached to their solar array.

Maine

Net metering: Maine offers a 1-t0-1 for kWh exported for net metering use. At the end of each calendar year, net metering credits are reset.

PACE loan: Property Assessed Clean energy loans allow for no money down, and rather than making monthly loan payments, customers repay with an annual assessment on property taxes. In Maine, customers can receive PACE loans for up to $15,000 for 15 years at a 4.99% interest rate.

All data sourced from energysage.com, solarreviews.com, and dsireusa.org.

Genie Solar Energy, a developer, designer, and installer of commercial solar systems, completed two rooftop solar installations in New Hampshire for INTEGRA Biosciences.

The installations total 572 kW and generate enough power to offset 844,000 kWh, equivalent to the annual electricity consumption of 96 houses.

Sara Schwandt, managing director of Genie Solar Energy, said the projects feature Prism Solar bifacial panels. The solar installations allow the bioscience company to offset more than half of the overall electricity consumption at the two U.S. facilities. Among other things, INTEGRA produces test kits for Covid-19.

Entergy to rely on gas while claiming Net-Zero Emissions in 2050: Entergy joined other large utilities last week in announcing its intent to achieve “net-zero emissions” by 2050, but like its regional peers of Duke and Southern, the company is charting a course that will rely heavily on gas. Gas, which is a fossil fuel that contributes to climate change, will make up as much as a quarter of Entergy’s electric capacity by 2050, according to the plan. Entergy CEO Leo Denault told investors in February the company planned to build as much as 4 GW of new gas by 2030. Entergy’s net zero announcement, timed in advance of its “Virtual Analyst Day”, comes on the heels of Southern Company’s announcement that it too would rely on gas while still claiming net zero emissions. Entergy has repeatedly blocked action on climate at the operating company level; its New Orleans subsidiary threatened the City of New Orleans if the city proceeded with a plan that would force the utility to move toward clean energy as part of an effort to combat climate change. Source: Energy and Policy Institute

New Hampshire House fails to override net metering veto: In March, the New Hampshire Senate had voted 17-7 to override the governor’s veto of Senate Bill 159, legislation that would have increased the state net metering limit from 1 to 5  MW. But on Sept. 16, the House failed to override the veto on a 207-130 vote. This is not the first year that Gov. Sununu has vetoed a net metering bill. He has said taxpayers would have to pay millions of dollars if the bill were to pass. Source: Daily Energy Insider

EPA raises legal questions about California’s plan to ban new gas-powered cars starting in 2035: The Environmental Protection Agency raised concerns about California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s plan to ban sales of new gasoline and diesel-powered passenger cars in the state by 2035, arguing that the mandate is impractical and possibly illegal. California’s rolling blackouts and requests for power from neighboring states “begs the question of how you expect to run an electric car fleet that will come with significant increases in electricity demand, when you can’t even keep the lights on today,” EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler said today in a letter to Newsom. Wheeler also said the order likely would not be able to be implemented by the California Air Resources Board without approval from the EPA, pointing out that the Trump administration in 2019 took away the state’s power to set its own vehicle tailpipe emissions standards. Source: Wall St. Journal, Axios

Report shows 184 GW of renewable energy installed globally in 2019, a new record: The global deployment of wind and solar projects reached a new record level in 2019, as falling costs and a push to zero emissions energy sources presented new opportunities that could be expanded in a post-Covid-19 economic recovery. The latest Global Trends In Renewable Energy Investment report, published as a collaboration between BloombergNEF, the Frankfurt School and the United Nations Environment Program, estimated that 184 GW of new renewable energy capacity, excluding hydro, was added in 2019, representing a 12% annual increase and setting a new annual record. Source: Renew Economy

Alabama regulators voted today to give the go-ahead to Alabama Power Company’s request to add energy from natural gas sources to its capacity to generate electricity. The plan, proposed last year, would include a new 726-megawatt gas unit at its Plant Barry near Mobile. The commission also voted to delay consideration of Alabama Power’s additional request to add 400 megawatts in solar-plus-storage generation to its inventory. Combined, the requests are estimated to cost Alabama Power $1.1 billion, which ultimately would be paid by its customers. Daniel Tait of Energy Alabama accused the PSC of “a complete abdication” of responsibility. “They caved in to Alabama Power’s (request) despite the company’s own analysis that solar-plus-storage was the least-cost resource,” he said. Source: WBHM

Geronimo Energy, a National Grid company, announced the start of construction activities for two Michigan solar projects for which Consumers Energy previously executed power purchase agreements. The projects, Bingham Solar and Temperance Solar, are part of a solar portfolio called MiSolar Portfolio and are located in Clinton and Monroe counties, respectively. Both projects are expected to begin operations by the end of this year. Geronimo has contracted with Michigan-based EPC, J. Ranck Electric, to construct the projects. Combined, the projects will produce 40 MW of clean, solar energy  Source: Geronimo Energy

NRG Energy signed 1,300 MW of solar power purchase agreements (PPAs) in Texas last summer, thanks to Texas retail competition policies that create favorable conditions, says Travis Kavulla, NRG Energy’s vice president of regulatory affairs. Yet those conditions are missing in the 13 other states that have retail competition, “where utility incumbents still dominate,” he said. (Those other states are shown in the map above.)

Texas, where NRG Energy is a competitive retail electricity provider, gives all retail providers “a significant incentive” to reduce the impact of price swings in the wholesale power market by entering long-term supply arrangements such as PPAs, said Kavulla.

In the other 13 states with retail choice in the Northeast and Midwest, program attributes have created roadblocks that prevent retail power providers from signing solar PPAs or otherwise securing long-term power supply, says a report from Wind Solar Alliance, which Kavulla calls “a major contribution to the conversation.” (The 34-page report was written by Rob Gramlich of Grid Strategies and Frank Lacey of Electric Advisors Consulting.)

As a result, although many retail choice states have policy goals to increase renewables generation, their retail providers are not in a position to help meet those goals, said Kevin O’Rourke, executive director of the Wind Solar Alliance.

Lower prices

The good news across retail choice states is that electricity customers benefit, says the report, from “much lower” prices for electricity than consumers in states with monopoly utilities, partly because reductions in wholesale power prices have been passed on to retail customers more quickly in retail choice states. Over a nine-year period, price increases in monopoly states cost customers $226 billion, while price reductions in retail choice states saved customers $332 billion:

Renewables investments

The report gives Texas a grade of “A” for affording retail providers an incentive to invest in generation resources, including low-cost renewables, while three other states considered in case studies—New Jersey, Maryland and Pennsylvania—receive far lower grades.

In Texas, retail suppliers are not pitted, as in other retail choice states, against an incumbent utility that may be favored in ten different ways, says the report.

For example, a typical rule in the 13 states besides Texas assigns all customers to the incumbent utility unless they opt out, whereas in Texas, customers must choose a provider in order to obtain electric service. And in the other states, incumbent utilities can undercut retail competitors on price as they shift “about 1-2 cents per kWh,” says the report, from the power prices they charge their retail customers to the distribution (wires) charges for which they bill everyone in their distribution area.

The report details other provisions that limit the ability of retail energy providers (REPs) to enter long-term contracts for generation resources. In all retail choice states, “Since REPs are never sure how much of their contracted customer load will stay with them from year to year, there is a role for another sort of entity to share in the risk of long-term contracting,” says the report. In Texas, it adds, “intermediaries that are financial players will often directly sign the contracts with generation on one side, and with REPs on the other side. As end-users shift from one REP to another, the intermediary experiences little risk, because the load still exists and is willing to buy the power they own.” In other words, in Texas the load cannot shift away from the REPs back to an incumbent utility, because there is none.

In the retail choice states besides Texas, while some retail providers market “100 percent clean” electricity, these retailers cannot drive development of new renewable resources, “because they do not make direct purchases of renewable energy from developers,” said Kevin O’Rourke, executive director of the Wind Solar Alliance. “Instead, they buy energy from the wholesale grid operators and are forced to buy generic capacity resources from the heavily regulated capacity constructs,” he said.

Adequate capacity

While the report does not focus on capacity markets, it notes that Texas—specifically, the ERCOT grid—does not have a capacity market. Even so, Texas has continued to meet peak demand, as documented by the North American Electric Reliability Corporation.

Meanwhile, in the PJM, NYISO, and ISO-NE grid regions where other retail choice states are located, says the report, “capacity payments make up around 30 percent of the value of the total wholesale energy market.”

In Texas, adequate capacity, also called reserve margins, “are produced because suppliers build enough to cover their obligations under contracts to deliver to their REP customers, and the REP customers have the incentive and ability to pay for enough capacity to cover various scenarios including generator outages,” says the report.

Australia, New Zealand and the United Kingdom also use the Texas approach to retail choice, says the report, which notes that “scarcity-based prices can reach $9,000 per MWh in Texas and $14,000 per MWh in Australia. Those prices can be thought of as speeding tickets or penalty payments for those who leave themselves too exposed by failing to procure the resources they need.”

TVA solicits 200 MW of renewables: The Tennessee Valley Authority announced today issued a request for proposals (RFP) for 200 MW of renewable energy that can be brought online by the end of 2023. Proposals are due to TVA by April 24 and the projects selected will be announced in the fall. To review the RFP or to submit a proposal, click here. While historically slow to adopt renewables, TVA has acted quickly in 2020. The utility contracted with Origis Energy for 200 MW of solar and 200 MWh of battery storage in February.

Sungrow supplies Wright Solar project: The Wright Solar project, a 200 MW installation located in California’s Central Valley is utilizing Sungrow 1500 volt inverters. Wright has been in operation since the start of the year and the energy generated by the project will be purchased by Peninsula Clean Energy, notably making this the largest project built exclusively for a Community Choice Aggregation agency. This project marks another important milestone for Sungrow, following the company’s December announcement that it had reached 100 GW of inverters shipped globally. It is also not the company’s first foray into supplying inverters to a project of such magnitude, as the company also supplied the 200 MW Techren-2 solar project in Nevada. Source: Sungrow

14 MW in Maine, represents 25% of installed capacity thus far: A 14.6 MW installation has been approved for the town of Auburn, Maine, following unanimous planning board approval. Technically, a third of the project will be located in Poland, Maine (there is also a China, Maine) but it has been fully approved nonetheless. The 14.6 MW capacity will represent a 25% addition to the state’s total installed capacity. The project is anticipated to come with a $17.6 million price tag, and will consist of 45 acres of panels over 142.7 acres of land. It is estimated that the project will start either in late fall or spring of 2021, concluding six to eight months after. Source: Sun Journal

20 MW approved in Indiana: 20 MW of solar energy are coming to South Bend, Indiana. The project will be developed by White Construction, a subsidiary of Infrastructure and Energy Alternatives, and will sit on a 200 acre site near South Bend. The project is expected to use nearly 60,000 modules. The hope is that the project will be competed by December 2020. The University of Notre Dame will support 40% of the facility’s renewable attributes in the hopes of reducing carbon emissions. Source: WishTV

Novel long-duration energy storage system installed at world’s largest CSP plant. The pilot program from Swedish start-up Azelio — which stores energy in molten aluminum — has been installed at the 580 MW Noor Ouarzazate solar complex (510 MW of CSP and 70 MW of PV). The technology uses electricity to heat recycled aluminum to 600°C. When power is required from the storage unit — which sits inside a shipping-container-style box — the stored thermal energy is transported to a Stirling engine using a heat-transfer fluid.  Source: Recharge