National Community Solar Partnership Launches Initiatives to Support Community Solar Projects
January 31, 2023
by Paul Ciampoli
APPA News Director
January 31, 2023
The U.S. Department of Energy’s National Community Solar Partnership recently launched a slate of initiatives to support the deployment of community solar projects.
Community solar allows any household to access the benefits of renewable energy, with an emphasis o those that cannot access rooftop solar, DOE noted.
DOE’s National Community Solar Partnership launched the Community Power Accelerator to bring together investors, philanthropic organizations, developers, community-based organizations, and technical experts to work together to get more equitable community solar projects financed and deployed.
The Accelerator will support developers with technical assistance and a Learning Lab to build a pipeline of verified, credit-ready projects that will connect with investors seeking to fund community solar in disadvantaged communities.
The Community Power Accelerator and its $10 million prize will leverage private-sector financing commitments to help community-based organizations and other mission-aligned project developers access financing and build community solar projects, particularly in disadvantaged and underrepresented communities.
Financial institutions and philanthropic organizations participating in the Accelerator have committed $5 billion in private sector financing for projects that are credit ready.
The Community Power Accelerator Prize is a new competition that will provide pre-development funds to organizations to build the expertise, experience, and capacity required to develop community solar projects at scale.
DOE is also launching a new campaign to highlight the connections between solar energy and its long-term benefits, beginning with community solar.
DOE said that community solar will play a vital role in supporting the Biden-Harris Administration’s Justice40 Initiative to ensure that every community benefits from the clean energy transition and in achieving the President’s goals of a 100% electric grid by 2035 and net-zero carbon emissions by 2050.
The Inflation Reduction Act established tax credits for solar energy projects, including a 20% bonus credit for solar power projects that sell their electricity to low-income households. This tax credit could support up to 18 GW of additional community solar projects over the next 10 years, DOE said.
The National Community Solar Partnership is working to increase community solar installed in the United States to 20 gigawatts.
In 2020-2021, the American Public Power Association partnered with the National Community Solar Partnership on the Municipal Utility Collaborative to identify and address common barriers to community-based solar for public power.
APPA joined the National Community Solar Partnership in 2020.
Peninsula Clean Energy Signs Contracts Expanding Renewable Energy, Storage Capability
January 25, 2023
by Paul Ciampoli
APPA News Director
January 25, 2023
California community choice aggregator Peninsula Clean Energy on Jan. 24 said that it has signed contracts for energy storage, geothermal, wind and small hydropower projects.
Nova III will be Peninsula Clean Energy’s first stand-alone storage project and will provide up to 50 megawatts of four-hour lithium-ion battery storage over 15 years beginning in August 2024. The project, developed by Calpine Corporation in Riverside County, California, displaces fossil fuel infrastructure as it is located on the same site and uses existing interconnection infrastructure of the former 750-MW Inland Empire gas turbine, the CCA said.
The Whitegrass No. 2 project will provide Peninsula Clean Energy with 6 megawatts of geothermal power over 20 years. Open Mountain Energy is developing the project in Lyon County, Nevada, with power coming online by the start of 2025.
The Burney Creek Hydroelectric Project will provide three megawatts of small hydroelectric power over 15 years from an existing Snow Mountain Hydro site in Shasta County, California, beginning in January 2024.
CalWind’s Wind Resource 1 began a three-year contract with Peninsula Clean Energy in January to provide nearly nine megawatts of wind power near Tehachapi in Kern County, California.
In addition to the four newly signed contracts, the Heber 2 geothermal facility began delivery in January and will provide Peninsula Clean Energy with 26 megawatts for 15 years. Peninsula Clean Energy signed the contract last year with Ormat Technologies, who developed the project in Imperial Valley, California.
The CCA said that all five projects will help Peninsula Clean Energy take important steps toward its goal of matching customer demand with 100-percent renewable power on an hourly basis 99 percent of the time by 2025.
The four newly signed contracts are the most recent to stem from a batch of 70 project proposals that Peninsula Clean Energy received from a November 2021 solicitation.
Omaha Public Power District to Build Solar Project On Landfill Site
January 13, 2023
by Peter Maloney
APPA News
January 13, 2023
Omaha Public Power District is using a $3.46 million grant from the Nebraska Environmental Trust to build a solar power plant at a former landfill site
The proposed OPPD-Douglas County SOLUS – for Solar on Landfills Utility Scale – project is a joint effort between OPPD and Douglas County and is sited on the Douglas County State Street landfill, a 160-acre parcel of land in Omaha. The landfill is capped and covered to isolate the waste, which limits the uses for the property.
“There are limited development opportunities directly on landfills, and utilizing the property for renewable energy is a win-win,” Kent Holm, director of Douglas County environmental services, said in a statement. “We already are using a third-party contractor to clean the landfill gas and pump it into [Metropolitan Utilities District’s] pipeline. Adding solar can be another positive step in utilizing the former landfill property and providing renewable energy.”
The first step in the development process is a feasibility study, which is slated to begin late this summer. The feasibility study will help determine the ideal size of the solar array and allow engineers to address any possible challenges, such as how to build around existing landfill features and the best way to fit it onto the contours of the land.
The NET grant will help support the cost difference between a typical ground-mounted utility-scale solar project and landfill solar project, which requires differences in design and construction.
OPPD said it plans to share what it learns from the project with other utilities that are interested in similar initiatives that provide benefits that extend well beyond the district’s 13-county footprint.
Northern California Power Agency Signs Geothermal Power Agreements
January 9, 2023
by Peter Maloney
APPA News
January 9, 2023
The Northern California Power Agency recently signed a set of long-term power purchase agreements to supply renewable geothermal energy and capacity to Silicon Valley Power, the public power utility serving the City of Santa Clara, and potentially other NCPA members.
Under the agreements, signed with the Geysers Power Company LLC, an indirect subsidiary of Calpine, NCPA will purchase and receive renewable energy produced from multiple Calpine geothermal plants in California’s Sonoma and Lake Counties from 2025 to 2036.
The agreements provide for the initial delivery of up to 50 megawatts of renewable energy and capacity, increasing to up to 100 MW from 2027 through to 2036.
NCPA and Geysers Power both individually own and operate geothermal plants in The Geysers area, one of the largest geothermal steam fields in the world.
“This long-term agreement to secure renewable baseload generation only furthers that objective and will help to assure a continued supply of affordable and reliable power for SVP customers for many years to come,” Randy Howard. NCPA’s general manager, said in a statement.
NCPA, based in Roseville, is a California joint powers agency serving nearly 700,000 electric customers was established in 1968 to build and operate electric generation facilities and assist in meeting the wholesale energy supply needs of its 16 members: the cities of Alameda, Biggs, Gridley, Healdsburg, Lodi, Lompoc, Palo Alto, Redding, Roseville, Santa Clara, Shasta Lake, and Ukiah, as well as Plumas-Sierra Rural Electric Cooperative, the Port of Oakland, San Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit, and the Truckee Donner Public Utility District.
California Regulators Issue Major Decision on Net Metering
December 18, 2022
by Peter Maloney
APPA News
December 18, 2022
The California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) on Thursday issued a decision revising the state’s Net Energy Metering (NEM) solar tariff to better reflect value of solar power and solar plus storage to the state’s grid.
The new NEM changes how customers of the state’s investor-owned utilities will be paid for solar power they do not consume and ship to the grid, basing those exports on the utilities’ avoided costs of buying clean electricity elsewhere rather than the utilities’ retail price of electricity.
The decision (Docket #: R.20-08-020) will promote solar exports during the late afternoon and early evening hours, particularly in the summer, when the grid is the most stressed, the CPUC said. The decision has no impact on existing rooftop solar customers, maintaining their current compensation rates.
The CPUC decision also provides extra electricity bill credits to residential customers who adopt solar or solar paired with battery storage in the next five years, which are paid on top of the avoided cost bill credits. Customers are guaranteed the extra bill credits for nine years.
The new NEM tariff also increases the allowable size of rooftop solar systems to cover 150 percent of a customer’s electricity usage in order to accommodate future electrification of appliances and vehicles. And the new NEM regime will also expand access to solar and storage for low-income customers, residents living in disadvantaged communities, and residents living in California tribal communities by providing a larger amount of extra bill credits.
The decision also applies new residential rates that have “significant differences” between peak and off-peak prices as a way of creating incentives for battery storage and load shifting from evening hours to overnight or midday hours, the CPUC said. The new rates aim to incentivize adoption of technologies to replace the use of fossil fuels such as battery storage, electric vehicles, and heat pump water heaters.
Reform of California’s net metering regime was mandated by a 2013 state law, Assembly Bill 327. The CPUC revised its original solar tariff program in 2016, creating NEM 2.0 and, most recently, revised its NEM proposal in November after the inclusion of a grid participation charge met with heavy criticism from many stakeholders.
Interior Awards Five Leases for Offshore Wind in Northern California
December 12, 2022
by Peter Maloney
APPA News
December 12, 2022
The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM), a division of the Department of the Interior (DOI), recently awarded five leases for offshore wind power development along the California coast.
The results of the BOEM lease sale represent the third major offshore wind lease sale this year and the first for the Pacific region, the DOI said. The sale drew competitive bids from five companies totaling $757.1 million, well exceeding the first lease sales that were held in the Atlantic, BOEM said.
The sale offered five lease areas covering 373,268 acres off central and northern California. The leased areas have the potential to produce over 4.6 gigawatts (GW) of wind energy, BOEM said.
The provisional lease winners are RWE Offshore Wind Holdings, California North Floating, Equinor Wind US, Central California Offshore Wind, and Invenergy California Offshore.
The lease sale included a 20 percent credit for bidders that committed to a monetary contribution to programs or initiatives supporting workforce training programs for the floating offshore wind industry, the development of a U.S. domestic supply chain for the floating offshore wind energy industry, or both. The DOI said the credit would result in over $117 million in investments.
The auction also included 5 percent credits for bidders that committed to entering community benefit agreements (CBA). One type of agreement is with communities, stakeholder groups, or Tribal entities whose use of the lease areas or use of the resources harvested from the lease areas is expected to be affected by offshore wind development. The second type of agreement is a general CBA with communities, Tribes, or stakeholders that are expected to be affected by the potential impacts on the marine, coastal or human environment from lease development.
Earlier this month, BOEM finalized two Wind Energy Areas (WEAs) in the Gulf of Mexico and said it planned to issue a proposed sale notice for the competition to lease the areas. The first WEA is approximately 27.6 miles off the coast of Galveston, Texas, and totals 508,265 acres. The second WEA is approximately 64.4 miles off the coast of Lake Charles, La., and totals 174,275 acres.
In February, the DOI announced the results of the nation’s highest-grossing competitive offshore energy lease sale in its history. The lease areas including oil and gas lease sales and six leases totaling more than 488,000 acres in the New York Bight for potential wind energy development, which drew winning bids from six companies totaling about $4.37 billion.
Salt River Project Using Inflation Reduction Act to Build and Own Solar Plant
December 8, 2022
by Peter Maloney
APPA News
December 8, 2022
Arizona public power utility Salt River Project (SRP) is building a solar power project that will take advantage of recent changes in federal law that allows public power utilities to use tax benefits that were previously out of reach.
SRP’s board of directors recently approved the second phase of the 55-megawatt (MW) Copper Crossing Energy and Research Center in Florence, Ariz.
The utility-scale solar project is the first the utility is developing and will own and operate itself.
Historically, SRP has contracted for generation from renewable resources through power purchase agreements with developers that have access to federal tax credits for renewable energy projects.
The federal Inflation Reduction Act passed in August extended and expanded various energy tax incentives and gave public power utilities direct access to those credits by allowing allows public power utilities to receive direct federal incentive payments for renewable projects.
SRP said the change will give it greater ability to develop, operate and advance more renewable resources and potentially reduce costs for customers.
The first phase of the Copper Crossing project will add two natural gas-fired turbines with a total output of less than 100 MW, which SRP’s board approved in September. A third proposed phase for small-scale, long-duration energy storage system is expected to go to the utility’s board for approval in 2023.
SRP has not yet completed the design of the new solar portion of the Copper Crossing site. Engineering, material procurement and construction activities for the solar facility are expected to take approximately 24 months. The solar project is sited on land SRP owns next to its Abel substation adjacent to an existing 20-MW solar plant.
With this development and other recent awards, SRP is contracted for over 2,000 MW of our goal to add 2,025 MW of new utility-scale solar energy by 2025, SRP noted.
Transmission Line to Link Wind Farm Off Coast of Long Island is Approved
November 30, 2022
by Peter Maloney
APPA News
November 30, 2022
The New York State Public Service Commission earlier this month approved a transmission line that will interconnect to a proposed wind farm off the coast of Long Island to the state’s electrical grid.
The 924-megawatt (MW) wind farm is sited in federal waters and would be the largest offshore wind farm to be connected to New York’s electric grid. The 25-mile transmission line will carry electricity from the proposed Sunrise Wind Farm to an existing substation in Brookhaven in Suffolk County.
The transmission line is a high-voltage, 320-kilovolt, direct current (DC) submarine export cable bundle that would be up to 5.2 miles long and enter New York State territorial waters three nautical miles from land. The transmission line then will transition from an offshore cable to an onshore cable that will travel up to 17.2 miles to an onshore converter station. The transmission line is being built by Sunrise Wind LLC.
The Sunrise wind farm is being developed by a partnership of Ørsted and Eversource with support from Con Edison Transmission and the New York Power Authority, which will assist the development of the transmission facilities needed to deliver the offshore wind energy to the electric transmission grid. The wind farm will be more than 30 miles east of Montauk Point.
Sunrise Wind is entering negotiations with New York State contractors and trade labor organizations on a project labor agreement to cover construction activities for the project and committing to paying prevailing wages.
The developers expect construction to start as early as 2023 with the wind farm entering service by 2025.
The offshore wind project will provide Long Island Power Authority (LIPA) customers with clean, affordable energy, Thomas Falcone, LIPA’s CEO, said in a statement. “Both South Fork Wind and Sunrise Wind are helping to build a new and dynamic offshore wind industry right here on Long Island — an industry that will protect our environment and provide new clean energy jobs.”
The Sunrise wind farm was awarded as part of New York State Energy Research and Development Authority’s (inaugural competitive 2018 offshore wind solicitation.
Construction on the South Fork Wind project, New York’s first offshore wind farm, began in February. The project was selected under a 2015 LIPA request for proposals to address growing power needs on the east end of Long Island.
Ribbon Cutting Held for Massachusetts Municipal Wholesale Electric Company Solar Field
November 29, 2022
by Paul Ciampoli
APPA News Director
November 29, 2022
The largest single solar field and the largest public power solar project in Massachusetts is nearing completion, the Massachusetts Municipal Wholesale Electric Company (MMWEC) recently reported.
A ribbon-cutting and dedication ceremony were held in October at the project site on the Ludlow property of MMWEC, the Commonwealth’s designated joint action agency for public power utilities.
The MMWEC/Master Sergeant Alexander Cotton Memorial Solar Project is a 6.9-megawatt AC/10.34- megawatt DC solar farm constructed on a 35-acre section of MMWEC’s Ludlow campus, which is adjacent to Westover Air Reserve Base.
Six MMWEC member municipal light plants are participating in the project, including those located in Boylston, Ipswich, Mansfield, Marblehead, Peabody and Wakefield. EDF Renewables is the project developer.
The project is named in honor of the late Master Sergeant Alexander Cotton of the 439th Airlift Wing at Westover Air Reserve Base, in appreciation of his dedication and service, and in recognition of the long history between MMWEC and Westover.
MMWEC said the project will generate more than 13,800 megawatt hours per year and will displace nearly 13,220,400 pounds of CO2 emissions from Massachusetts power plants per year, based on current ISO New England average emissions.
Featuring state of the art bifacial module technology, the panels produce energy from direct sunlight as well as light reflected onto the backside of the panels. This allows for better year-round production, including during the winter, when snow cover on the ground reflects light onto the back of the panel, MMWEC noted.
“Consistent with the Commonwealth’s decarbonization roadmap, the solar project allows the participating municipal light departments to increase the non-carbon generation mix in their power portfolios, while helping them to maintain stable rates for their customers,” said MMWEC CEO Ronald DeCurzio.
SMUD and NREL Partner on Software to Speed Rooftop Solar Applications
November 22, 2022
by Peter Maloney
APPA News
November 22, 2022
Researchers at the Sacramento Municipal Utility District (SMUD) and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) have developed a tool to make it easier for utilities to interconnect residential solar panels to the grid.
The software – named PRECISE for PREconfiguring and Controlling Inverter SEt-points – aims to help utilities identify optimal inverter modes and settings for distributed solar.
The standalone system allows utility engineers to seamlessly interconnect photovoltaic (PV) solar generation, cutting the waiting times and costs for customers, NREL said.
Utilities can receive hundreds of requests a day to connect customers’ rooftop solar systems to their grid. Each application for interconnection requires a technical evaluation to assess the potential grid impacts of the solar installation. Currently utilities are evaluating interconnection applications manually, which puts increasing demands on distribution engineers.
To manage solar interconnection requests, utilities often use hosting capacity analysis to provide public visibility into the capacity of their networks to accommodate solar installations. The resulting maps provide a snapshot that lets customers know if their local grid can accommodate new solar generation. But the maps, although useful for high-level planning, do not answer the question of whether individual solar applications can interconnect to the grid, as every interconnection can trigger unique local distribution system constraints, NREL said.
PRECISE automates the modeling of all of SMUD’s 40,000-plus low-voltage distribution lines connected to houses and rooftop solar and pulls in advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) data as required.
The software also uses local irradiance measurements across SMUD’s service area and creates mathematical models of each incoming solar system, including every component of the solar panels and their orientations, as well as the inverters and smart inverter capabilities. Data is pulled in as soon as a customer’s interconnection application is created and updates utility planning, metering and design teams, creating a streamlined solar interconnection process tailored to SMUD’s local needs.
“PV interconnection evaluation is becoming a time-consuming process as each proposed solar power system must be individually reviewed in detail to make sure it works safely with our grid,” Sheikh Hassan, a principal distribution engineer at SMUD, said in a statement. “PRECISE significantly reduces this evaluation time by instantly determining optimal inverter settings for a given location.”
A common scenario for SMUD customers involves requests to interconnect solar power systems larger than the grid could accommodate in a specific location. “The task to determine optimal smart inverter settings in order to maximize our PV hosting capacity will become more complex and time intensive as the number of PV interconnection applications increase,” Hassan said.
Smart inverter functions can be the deciding factor on whether an interconnection must be downsized or not, and PRECISE enables that evaluation, leveraging inverter functions as needed, to help accommodate more solar onto the grid, he said.
PRECISE went live at SMUD on in February and has processed over 1,700 applications in the first six months of operation, an average of 13 applications each business day and as many as nearly 30 applications in one day. Using automation, data integration, and fast computing techniques, PRECISE could handle hundreds of applications daily, NREL said.
NREL and SMUD said they are exploring future collaborations based on PRECISE’s ability to link the diverse utility data sets needed for automated evaluation of new distributed energy resources. PRECISE could be applied to large commercial solar sites, to assess battery energy storage, or to evaluate the impact of electric vehicles as they connect to the grid, the partners said.