Four Virginia electric co-operatives have petitioned the Virginia State Corporation Commission (VSCC) to begin a community solar pilot program under legislation passed last year called the Community Solar Act.
The pilot, which the co-operatives expect to last three years, would provide for the construction of two facilities in the state, the power from which members could subscribe.
The four cooperatives asking for approval are Rappahannock Electric Cooperative, A and N Electric Cooperative, Mecklenburg Electric Cooperative and Northern Neck Electric Cooperative, all of whom are members of Old Dominion Electric Cooperative (ODEC).
ODEC currently has 30 MW of solar in its portfolio, which provides members with some access to solar already. Under the new program, customers who want a larger percentage of solar would receive a predetermined amount of their electricity from solar sources each month.
The cooperatives expect to receive approval of their community solar pilot programs later this spring and hope to begin offering solar subscriptions this summer.
Central Virginia Electric Cooperative, which is not a participant in ODEC, submitted an application in December to begin a similar program.
Community solar is not unheard of in Virginia. A 550 kW system in the Shenandoah Valley, owned by BARC Electric, was the Commonwealth’s first community solar project and was commissioned in 2016.
In May, then-Governor Terry McAuliffe signed four bills into law designed to kickstart solar development in the state. In addition to the community solar law, the laws:
- increased the maximum size of renewable projects from 100 MW to 125 MW and exempted residential rooftop from having to apply for and receive a Certificate of Public Convenience and Necessity from the Virginia State Corporation Commission, which oversees utility regulation in the state;
- created a Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) pilot program, under the auspices of ApCo, to encourage private colleges and universities to add solar to their electricity portfolio; and
- converted the Virginia Solar Energy Development Authority to the Virginia Solar Energy and Battery Storage Development Authority, reflecting the growing importance of batter-storage technology in the future of the solar industry. It also expanded participation in the authority by four seats.
It should be noted that the Virginia Solar Energy and Energy Storage Authority (VSEESA) has been largely ineffective in promoting solar in the Commonwealth, soliciting a mere 10 MW of small-scale solar in September. The VSEESA has been existence since 2015.
This content is protected by copyright and may not be reused. If you want to cooperate with us and would like to reuse some of our content, please contact: editors@pv-magazine.com.
By submitting this form you agree to pv magazine using your data for the purposes of publishing your comment.
Your personal data will only be disclosed or otherwise transmitted to third parties for the purposes of spam filtering or if this is necessary for technical maintenance of the website. Any other transfer to third parties will not take place unless this is justified on the basis of applicable data protection regulations or if pv magazine is legally obliged to do so.
You may revoke this consent at any time with effect for the future, in which case your personal data will be deleted immediately. Otherwise, your data will be deleted if pv magazine has processed your request or the purpose of data storage is fulfilled.
Further information on data privacy can be found in our Data Protection Policy.