Colorado

Happy Valentines Day and welcome to your pv magazine USA morning brief! Today we’ll be looking at a Tesla Powerwall owner who’s system was so efficient in an outage, he didn’t know there was one, the limbo of Illinois solar projects, a team of teenage girl engineers that designed a solar powered tent for the homeless and everything else you need to know this morning.

Per an analysis by Vibrant Clean Energy, it’ll take approximately 2.8 GW of solar power, 8 GW of wind and 765 MW / 3 GWh of energy storage to allow Colorado to shut down its 4 GW of coal by 2025, while also lowering electric rates by 5%.

Hello, happy Thursday and welcome to the pv magazine USA morning brief. Today we’ll be taking a look at Fitch Ratings downgrading the Solar Star project, the question of if the public is willing to pay to help fix climate change, and a really cool video about Colorado’s largest battery.

The Colorado generation co-op has one-upped Xcel Energy, as the 100% renewable energy movement grows even in the energy industry. However, there are some sticky caveats.

By setting a timeline for the inevitable decarbonization of its fleet, Xcel is moving to have an energy transition on its terms.

The Colorado Public Utilities Commission has issued an order that gets rid of a requirement that renewable energy facilities go through an auction process before qualifying for PURPA contracts – as well as deciding to require utilities to examine energy storage as an alternative to infrastructure.

The company has partnered with Pivot Energy to provide 2.7 MW of capacity over 23 Colorado and Illinois locations.

Governors-elect in Colorado and Connecticut want a 100% renewables mandate. Approaching 100% is the goal for governors-elect in Illinois, Nevada and Maine.

RGS Energy says it expects to deliver its first POWERHOUSE solar shingles in December. The company did not accept deposits for its $127 million in written reservations, but now that UL approval is in they’re soliciting those groups for cash deposits.

The new governors favor policies such as a higher renewables mandate, community solar, increased use of storage, and expanding the Western grid, reports the nonprofit Advanced Energy Economy.