{"id":292,"date":"2012-12-06T09:26:57","date_gmt":"2012-12-06T14:26:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2012\/12\/financing-solar-energy-georgias-special-problem.html"},"modified":"2012-12-06T09:26:57","modified_gmt":"2012-12-06T14:26:57","slug":"financing-solar-energy-georgias-special-problem","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2012\/12\/financing-solar-energy-georgias-special-problem.html","title":{"rendered":"Financing solar energy: Georgia’s special problem"},"content":{"rendered":"

\nIn most states, financing solar energy is largely a matter of learning
\nall the local ropes.
\nIn Georgia, there’s a bigger problem.\n<\/p>\n

\nMichael Mendelsohn
\nwrote for RMI 5 December 2012,
\n
\nHow Do We Lower Solar Installation Costs and Open the Market to Securitized Portfolios: Standardize and Harmonize<\/a>,\n<\/p>\n

\n

\nSoft costs can be pretty tough. The cost of solar installations can
\nbe generally separated into “hard” costs \u2014 representing
\nprimary components such as modules, racking, inverters \u2014 and
\nsoft costs including legal, permitting, and financing. While the
\nformer group \u2014 particularly modules \u2014 have dropped
\ndramatically over the last several years, the latter have not.
\nAccording to a recent NREL analysis, these costs represent roughly
\n30% of both residential and utility installations (slightly less for
\ncommercial-host systems). See Figure 1.\n<\/p>\n


\n<\/a><\/p>\n

\nIn fact, soft costs are so critical to the overall success of solar
\nadoption, their reduction is a primary focus of the Department of
\nEnergy’s SunShot Initiative to make solar energy cost-competitive.
\nIn order to reduce the cost of financing, NREL recently completed
\nand continues to work on various efforts to tap public capital
\nmarkets and enable other vehicles that securitize project
\nportfolios.\n<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\nWe’ll come back to tapping public capital markets and the like,
\nbecause that’s the key to what
\n
\nGeorgia Solar Utilities (GaSU) is trying to do.<\/a>
\nBut there’s a special problem in Georgia, buried in the next paragraph:\n<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\n

\nDoing so requires standardized contracts, interconnection
\nagreements, and other relevant documentation so these projects can
\nbe easily aggregated with a consistent set of risk factors.
\nUnfortunately, a myriad of unique state renewable portfolio
\nstandards (RPS), interconnection protocols, and\/or permitting
\nprocesses prevent the possibility of solar projects becoming
\nroutine.\n<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\nWe don’t have an RPS in Georgia.
\nWhy?
\nBecause
\n
\nALEC’s “our state legislators”<\/a>
\nkeep propping up Georgia Power’s interpretation of
\n
\nthe 1973 Territorial Electric Service Act.<\/a>
\n
\n<\/a>
\nWhat do Georgia Power and its parent the Southern Company want to do instead?
\nSO CEO Thomas A. Fanning has spelled that out in several different formats:
\n
\nnuclear, “21st century coal”, natural gas, renewables, and efficiency.<\/a>
\nWhen does he want renewables (solar and wind)?
\n
\n“probably very late in this decade or beyond that, we still are gonna
\nget by far the lion’s share of electricity from central stations.”<\/a>
\nYou can see him say that on video, along with what he called Georgia’s
\nfranchise law “that we need to protect.”
\nProtect so SO and Georgia Power can continue to wallow in their
\n
\n<\/a>
\n
\nthree-legged nuclear regulatory-capture stool<\/a>
\nof a stealth tax on Georgia Power bills, PSC approval of cost overruns,
\nand an $8.33 billion federal loan guarantee.
\nYou know, you don’t need a federal loan guarantee to float bonds for solar
\nenergy, because soalr is not a bet-the-farm risk<\/a> like nuclear!
\n
\n<\/a>
\nSolar gets installed on budget and often ahead of schedule, like in Denmark, way to the north of us!<\/a>
\nSO’s backwards priorities are why the SO states of Georgia and Alabama
\nand Mississippi and northern Florida and some surrounding states
\ndon’t have Renewable Portfolio Standards.
\nSO and Georgia Power’s nuclear buggywhip priorities are why
\n
\ntiny Denmark is way ahead of Southern Company,<\/a> not just in Georgia,
\nbut even including SO’s southwestern solar farms.
\nAnd to change that, we need to find a way around that Territorial Act
\nto get financing for solar energy.\n<\/p>\n

\n

\nAssuming 75% of the installed cost of residential solar project are
\nsold into the securitization pool and a 5-kW average system size, a
\n$100 million fund can source roughly 4,700 systems. To put that in
\nperspective, that’s roughly the entire number of “pipeline” projects
\nunder development in New Jersey [3], the second most active state in
\nthe country (which likely includes some projects of much larger
\nsize). In effect, residential-only projects from less active states
\ncould benefit from standard contracts, evaluation practices, and
\nother protocols to enable access to public capital markets. [4]\n<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\n75% was the rebate Austin Energy started providing for rooftop
\n(home and business) solar installations after AE’s
\n
\n<\/a>
\n
\nsudden flip to solar in 2003.<\/a>
\nThey ran the numbers and found they could get as much energy as a coal
\nplant that way, for the same investment.\n<\/p>\n

\nHm, what if GaSU (or somebody) tapped capital markets and provided
\nsolar installation rebates across Georgia?
\nThat way the jobs (planning, delivery, installation, studying) would
\nbe distributed across Georgia, as would the delivered energy and the
\ndirectly lowered bills.
\nIf GaSU wrapped that in along with their single-location
\nsolar plant,
\n
\nGaSU could help all of us at the same time.<\/a>
\nOr somebody else could.\n<\/p>\n

\n-jsq\n<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In most states, financing solar energy is largely a matter of learning all the local ropes. In Georgia, there’s a bigger problem. Michael Mendelsohn wrote for RMI 5 December 2012, How Do We Lower Solar Installation Costs and Open the Market to Securitized Portfolios: Standardize and Harmonize, Soft costs can be pretty tough. The cost […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[606,14,8,18,2,19,20,104,21,22,23,73,24,36],"tags":[1249,8794,772,8704,713,102,8701,8708,101,8699,8709,8702,8710,12,7,1251,8737,8711,8712,8713,1248,1252,1253,145,8731,1250,8714,108,221,6,8716],"class_list":["post-292","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-austinenergy","category-economy","category-georgia","category-georgia-power","category-government","category-history","category-law","category-nuclear","category-planning","category-politics","category-renewable-energy","category-safety","category-solar","category-wind","tag-austin-energy","tag-austinenergy","tag-denmark","tag-economy","tag-financing","tag-gasu","tag-georgia","tag-georgia-power","tag-georgia-solar-utilities","tag-government","tag-history","tag-lake","tag-law","tag-lowndes-area-knowledge-exchange","tag-lowndes-county","tag-nrel","tag-nuclear","tag-planning","tag-politics","tag-renewable-energy","tag-renewable-energy-portfolios","tag-rmi","tag-rocky-mountain-institute","tag-rps","tag-safety","tag-soft-costs","tag-solar","tag-southern-company","tag-thomas-a-fanning","tag-valdosta","tag-wind"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/292","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=292"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/292\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=292"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=292"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=292"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}