Macro
This week marked a change in direction of our federal government’s energy policy. While previous administrations have supported renewable energy goals and honored our commitments to the international community regarding climate goals, the incoming administration will be working to reverse those efforts.
The new president stated that he was taking action to withdraw from the Paris Agreement on Climate (again) stating “I will also declare a national energy emergency. We will drill, baby, drill. America will be a manufacturing nation once again, and we have something that no other manufacturing nation will ever have: the largest amount of oil and gas of any country on Earth. And we are going to use it. We will bring prices down, fill our strategic reserves up again, right to the top, and export American energy all over the world. We will be a rich nation again. And it is that liquid gold under our feet that will help to do it.”
For our part we do not agree with this proposed national energy policy. We do not agree that this is a reasonable path to wealth for anyone other than oil companies and gas utilities, nor is it sustainable for the environment.
We have spent over two decades installing solar in order to make the cleanest electricity possible at the point of use, to the benefit of our clients that own the solar arrays on their roofs. Over 1200 of our clients have installed rooftop solar arrays on the Olympic and Kitsap Peninsulas, and electric vehicle charging equipment, and have electrified where they can in order to save money and replace the burning of polluting fossil fuels.
If your goals for a personal energy policy involve making clean energy and saving money on your bills, please email or call to learn more about how solar could work at your home.
by Andy Cochrane | Jan 24, 2025
The incoming administration’s position on energy provides interesting insight into what is to be expected from the federal government in the next four years. The new administration will surely be friendlier to coal mining, oil drilling onshore and offshore, and fracking for natural gas.
https://greatagain.gov/energy-independence-69767de8166#.zce8a6e9p
If implemented, those strategies will degrade our natural environment, lease our public lands to their cronies at low rates, increase our transfer rate of carbon currently locked in the ground into the air as CO2, increase our contribution to climate change, and increase your dependence on the oil tyrants.
My personal response will be to enlarge the solar PV arrays at my home and business, and make certain as much of my driving as possible is in an electric vehicle.
In this way I can decrease my personal contribution to the negative aspects of the administration’s carbon-based fossil fuel plans, and minimize my financial support of the centralized energy corporations, while keeping more of my money available to invest in my own family’s future.
Morgan Residence, 6.9 KW SunPower, Port Angeles, June 2016
by Andy Cochrane | Dec 20, 2016
“Net Metering” describes the relationship between a utility and its customer when the customer has rooftop solar that is sometimes feeding the grid in addition to supporting their own loads, and the customer is compensated at the same rate as they are charged per kwh consumed or provided. In Washington, we have a net metering law requiring utilities to accept net metering systems up to a total capacity of 0.5% of the 1996 peak load. For more info read here https://powertripenergy.com/solar-faq/
Many utilities are now reaching that level, and due to the PR efforts of national electric industry interests, some local utilities are using language they have heard which threatens solar here in Washington. Increasing the legislative caps on net metering is crucially important to allowing private individuals the freedom to invest their own funds in upgrading their house with solar, and being compensated at a fair rate for the clean electricity they provide to the utility. Unfortunately the legislature has had a difficult time addressing this issue, even though the present cap of 0.5% of a peak load from 20 years ago is miniscule.
Here is how three other states are faring, based on recent news:
Hawaii’s Utility commission has voted to end net metering after seeing solar on as many as 16% of the homes on Oahu. This is poor policy, and will probably lead to grid-defection among some people who can afford batteries and who have large parcels (Hawaii law requires utility electrical service on standard small residential lots.) http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/hawaii-regulators-shutdown-hecos-net-metering-program
New York regulators have suspended the caps on net metering in an effort not to interrupt installations as reaching the current 6% of load cap is imminent. http://www.utilitydive.com/news/ny-regulators-lift-solar-net-metering-caps-until-rev-docket-sets-der-values/407667/
In Vermont, the net metering cap was raised from 4% to 15% two years ago, a cap that has now been reached. Regulators are considering removing the cap. http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/oct/24/vermont-reaching-net-metering-cap-with-solar-expan/
Based on the level of solar other states are working to achieve, if you hear anyone talking about solar causing problems in Washington at 0.5% capacity, your response should be skepticism.
by Andy Cochrane | Oct 26, 2015
Environment Washington has released a report calculating a 56% increase in solar pv installed in Washington State last year over the existing capacity. A 56% increase in capacity in one year is tremendous, and agrees with our experience and observations.
http://environmentwashington.org/news/wae/new-report-solar-energy-person-grew-56-percent-washington-state-last-year
We are seeing a similar increase in 2015, and forecast that we will again see that increase over 2015 in 2016. A portion of this growth has been driven by the decrease in price of solar pv modules, and a portion of 2016’s growth will be due to the expiration of the Federal 30% tax credit.
To qualify for the 30% Federal Tax Credit on solar, a project must be complete by Dec 31, 2016. We are currently booking projects for Spring of 2016, and we forecast that our installation calendar for 2016 will be filled before the middle of next year. We are also still looking for another qualified licensed electrician to join our team and further increase our installation capacity.
For solar capacity to continue to grow at this rate in Washington after the conclusion of federal incentives, we need to increase our net metering capacity by updating our once progressive but now dated net metering law. Increasing our state’s required net metering capacity requires no expenditures on the part of the state or utilities, it merely enables individuals and business to invest their own money in upgrading their facilities with solar.
by Andy Cochrane | Oct 23, 2015
I recently came across this interesting info-graphic. It is a couple of years old now and does not apply to Washington State. It mentions how different states look at determining a reasonable amount of power generation that can come from net metered solar, and uses examples of 15%, 25% (Hawaii), or 50% (California) and different thresholds to use as a basis for those percentages.
Here in Washington State, utilities are only required to allow 0.5% of the 1996 peak load – such a low threshold it is ridiculously limiting. Thankfully the utilities in which we have surpassed this threshold have seen no problems with allowing additional net metering systems. In the coming months we will be working closely with our legislators to address this archaic and potentially stifling limitation before it negatively affects our clients and our community.
Enjoy this explanatory graphic:
http://ilsr.org/archiac-utility-rules-stall-local-solar-infographic/
Another beautiful ground mounted array for beautiful people in Poulsbo, October 2014.
by Andy Cochrane | Oct 30, 2014
The year 2011 was a good year for big solar in the US, in terms of large scale projects (1 megawatt and larger). Utility-scale installations are on a dramatic upswing, surpassing the growth-rate and overall megawatt capacity of residential installations, and nearly equal to the commercial pv installations in 2011. Larry Sherwood has published a preview of his 2011 national market survey in the July/Aug 2012 issue of Solar Today, not yet online but soon to be digital athttp://ases.org/solar-today-magazine/ His study is commissioned by IREC and the full report will be available later this summer at http://www.irecusa.org/news-events/publications-reports/
Much of this flurry of activity is the result of the closing window of the US 1603 Grant Program, in which commercial and utility sector installations qualified for a 30% grant from the federal government, in lieu of the 30% tax credit, which is also available for residential projects. While the tax credit is in place until 2016, the 1603 grant had a very short window of existence. It was authorized by law in 2009, but wasn’t really available until 2010 after a lengthy rules-making process by the Treasury Dept. The grant expired at the end of 2011, and was the subject of much press and concern among our clients, though this did not affect them at all, since we install nearly exclusively in the residential sector.
The purpose of the grant was to make the same 30% federal incentive available in cases where the project owners did not have sufficient tax liability to take advantage of the tax credit. It is often the case that a large project will be undertaken by an LLC, S-Corp, or some other form of business unit created exclusively for the development of that particular project. The corporations don’t have any tax liability until after the projects become profitable, and so it is problematic for them to take the tax credits for the initial development. The 1603 grant in lieu of tax credit solved this problem for developers, but only for a relatively short time. The brief window of opportunity is difficult for developers of large projects to put together ownership groups, financing, insurance, permitting, any required environmental mitigations, etc. We are lucky to have the stable tax policy for the basic tax credit for the residential and small commercial installations we address.
A couple of times a week, people send me news and notice of a new large scale, ground-mounted, utility-scale pv installation being installed. I have reservations about these projects for several reasons. I should start by saying that of course they are preferable to a new coal plant, before I express my concerns about them. From an environmental stand-point, they are tremendously superior to other power plants. There are downsides to all activity, but from a perspective of pollutants and environmental hazards, the large scale pv power plants are better in every respect.
There are three main problems I see with these utility scale pv projects however. Some people have the opinion that these plants are going in hitherto-unused land, usually in the middle of a desert. I have spent some time in deserts in the American south west, and while you can successfully find places with no people, there is no “unused” land. There is definitely habitat degradation that occurs in conjunction with these activities, and some of the species affected are already highly impacted by human development.
Whether that impact is anywhere near comparable to the impact that would be the result of a similarly sized coal plant – I doubt it, but is truthfully beyond my ability to answer. I have seen some of these projects installed in formerly used agricultural land in California that is now fallow for some reason – most likely due to unsustainable farming practices. I would rather see agricultural reclamation of these areas as I know that most of southern California is in sore need of cleaner air and water, and that sound organic agricultural practices are probably a fine way to have a positive impact on air and water locally. Covering the ground with pv modules may power Fresno’s air conditioners, but doesn’t contribute to the overall solutions, of which some perennial agriculture could address. Instead of covering land that is home to some of the unique plants and animals of the earth, wouldn’t it be better to put solar panels over areas that are truly not used, such as over land we’ve already covered with concrete, asphalt, or buildings?
Secondly, there is inefficiency in transmission. By placing a large pv array hundreds of miles from the point of use, we need fairly expensive transmission infrastructure, complete with huge rights of way and also power losses inherent in transmission. This centralized power production model is the traditional mode of power generation and transmission. If you need more energy, just build more power plants and more transmission lines. To this line of thinking, any big problem just requires a bigger hammer. There is much more efficiency and elegance in created the power at the point of use. Doesn’t it make more sense to avoid the inherent inefficiencies of transmission and make power where and when it is needed?
Perhaps the biggest problem with these utility-scale pv plants is that in effect, they are privatizing a democratically distributed natural resource. I have a funny feeling when I see my environmentalist friends celebrating these large pv installations, or forwarding to me a graphic showing how pv in North Africa could provide enough energy for the whole world. Sure, it’s better than a coal plant environmentally, but there is a major problem with the economic model. Without delving too much into politics or philosophy, perhaps I can explain this best if I just say I want my own solar power and I don’t want to pay The Man. Think about writing that check every month to the utility. Think about where that money goes. Even if you have a local public utility handling the local distribution network, the bulk of your electricity dollar goes to the people who are supplying the originally generated electricity, who own the power plants – and their bankers. I don’t want any of my money going to them.
The solution to all of these shortcomings is found within the model our company has pursued, appropriate to our scale and our community – that of distributed generation and individual ownership of local clean renewable energy systems. The utility scale model occupies land that is a natural resource, (commonly public land and fragile environments), distributes the power inefficiently, to the economic benefit of the investors and project developers. The individual scale project generally occupies rooftops, uses the power generated on-site or ships onto the grid and across the street to the neighbors, and provides the direct economic benefit to the homeowner.
I would guess that 1/3 of the homes in the US are occupied by their owners who either own their homes outright or have equity in their homes. I would also guess that at least here in the northwest, 1/3 of the homes have a good unshaded roof suitable for pv. So the bottom line is that until we’ve figured out a way to get solar onto the 1/9 (11%) of the homes that meet those two conditions, we probably shouldn’t spend much time swooning over massive utility-owned pv arrays in the desert.
There are many shades of gray between these two choices, including Community Solar projects such as the Ellensburg project pictured below, and there are lots of ways third parties are trying to get involved in such a manner as to skim the economic benefits from the homeowners in residential pv projects. No surprise there right? Community solar and project financing will be topics of subsequent articles.
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President Obama touting clean energy in front of 250 MW of First Solar pv in Boulder City, NV, 2012.
Project owned by Sempra US Gas & Power, NASDAQ symbol SRE
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Steve and Caleb of Power Trip Energy touting and installing clean community-owned solar, 13 KW of First Solar pv in Ellensburg, WA, 2009.
Project owned by Ellensburg electricity rate payers and administered by the City of Ellensburg, WA
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by Andy Cochrane | Jul 21, 2012
