MISO

Consumers has reached an agreement with Michigan regulators to allow for the development of over half a gigawatt of its 3 GW interconnection queue by 2023. However, while the current backup is being remedied, what’s to stop another one down the line?

Long seen as a slow region for solar deployment, the U.S. Midwest has seen an explosion of project development in recent years. And while there is still a lot of speculation and uncertainty, one way or another this region is going to see major development.

Nearly all of the solar installed in Minnesota last year was community solar, which enabled a 47% increase in the state’s installed capacity. And the best may be yet to come.

Hello and welcome to today’s edition of the pv magazine morning brief. Today we’ll be looking at MISO potentially fast-tracking ‘shovel-ready’ renewables, a Georgia lab that hasn’t given up hope on solar roads, Kentucky’s funding imbalance in the net metering fight and everything else you need today.

The research and consultancy group’s study of the latest polar vortex shows the need for greater interconnection of grids and 18-40 hours of energy storage in the Upper Midwest under high renewable energy scenarios. It also shows a potential role for nuclear power; but other extreme weather events tell a different story.

Developers have applied to build 139 GWac of large-scale solar projects in the territory of six grid operators – around five times what is currently online across the country – and that figure doesn’t even cover the entire United States. By any metric, we are looking at an unprecedented boom in solar development over the next five years.

The developer and asset manager have signed a deal to develop 2 GWac of solar projects in six Midwestern states – more than the entire capacity that is currently online in those states. But this appears to only the beginning for the region.

A study sponsored by NRDC and Sierra Club finds that old coal plants can be retired and safely replaced by solar and other resources, which will reduce pollution and save money for utility customers

As the completion of the multi-year rule-making the federal agency will require grid operators to value the contributions of energy storage, and begins a process to look at how aggregated distributed energy resources can compete in wholesale markets.

MISO plans to conduct a multi-year study of how increasing amounts of solar and other forms of renewable energy will impact its territory and how to manage expected growth.