The Open PV Project goes offline
The U.S. Department of Energy has shut down the site for its Open PV Project, which supplied cost and installation data. Is this the winding down of a project whose time had come, or part of a more disturbing trend?
Residential solar is getting cheaper – except for third-party
EnergySage has found that the average price for PV systems quoted through its site has fallen under $3 per watt, echoing findings by Lawrence Berkeley National Labs. However, prices are increasing for the big third-party solar companies.
Tesla is selling commercial solar as cheap as $1.01/W
The new tool launched for C&I solar customers is yet another example of Tesla being able to drive down system prices by ditching traditional sales models and customer acquisition costs.
Gas favored over solar as Memphis utility considers TVA exit
Memphis is studying the potential to save money by exiting its contract with TVA. At issue is how much solar and storage to include in any new generating portfolio.
States could save consumers billions with solar, by requiring transparent utility modeling
Utilities routinely make modeling choices that disadvantage low-cost solar in their 15- or 20-year resource plans. With transparent modeling, states and intervenors could easily see those biased choices. And if they also have access to the same model used by the utility, they can fix those errors by running the model themselves, as recommended by a modeling expert. Billions of dollars are at stake.
San Diego Gas and Electric looks to quadruple customers’ minimum monthly bill
The utility is looking to raise its monthly minimum utility charge from $10 to $38 under the premise that distributed solar customers represent a “cost shift” to other utility customers.
sonnen turns apartment complex into dispatchable solar + storage power plant
Local utility Rocky Mountain Power will use rooftop solar and 600 batteries at the Soleil Lofts community in Utah to supply demand response and manage peaks on its system, as the latest behind-the-meter contract.
Bernie Sanders wants to nationalize clean energy
The most radical part of Bernie Sander’s plan may not even be a call to move to 100% renewable electricity by 2030. It’s how his campaign proposes to go about it.
SEIA shreds DTE Energy’s resource plan
2 GW more solar in the near term would save DTE’s Michigan customers $1 billion. DTE proposes only 11 MW of near-term solar, or less than one percent of the optimal amount.
The great module supply crunch
The volume of large-scale solar under construction in the United States has hit a new high of nearly 10 GW, as solar panel prices continue to rise and supply tightens for projects trying to beat the ITC step-down.
