Map of State 3rd Party PPA Rules

Date: 9 May 2012 | posted in: Energy, Energy Self Reliant States | 2 Facebooktwitterredditmail

In lieu of smarter policy, schools, libraries, and city buildings hoping to install solar power have to resort to complex public-private partnerships to access federal tax incentives.  One common strategy is the power purchase agreement (PPA). In essence, a PPA allows the public building owner to buy solar electricity on contract from a third party (instead … Read More

Overturning the ‘15% Rule’ Expands the Distributed Generation Opportunity in California

Date: 8 May 2012 | posted in: Energy, Energy Self Reliant States | 0 Facebooktwitterredditmail

If you haven’t heard yet, there’s a “rule” that precludes distributed renewable energy projects from supplying more than 15% of the power to most “distribution circuits” (part of the low-voltage electric grid that brings power into homes and businesses).  With the rapidly falling cost of solar power, many places in the country are starting to push … Read More

Who Has the Most Cost-Effective Solar Feed-in Tariff?

Date: 4 May 2012 | posted in: Energy, Energy Self Reliant States | 7 Facebooktwitterredditmail

In a forthcoming report on U.S. feed-in tariff programs, I’ll provide a comparison of solar feed-in tariff (FIT, a.k.a. CLEAN Contract) rates across the United States. Comparing published rates is not particularly helpful, however, because contract lengths vary (from 15 to 25 years) and the solar resource also varies widely.  For international comparisons (e.g. Germany), it’s also … Read More

Local Solar Could Solve ‘Massive Supply-Demand Imbalance’ in Renewable Energy Financing

Date: 1 May 2012 | posted in: Energy, Energy Self Reliant States | 2 Facebooktwitterredditmail

In the next two years, the U.S. may get a lot less solar and wind power than it could. It’s not a shortage of solar panels or the cost of turbines.  Rather, it’s a problem of the perverse nature of federal incentives for renewable energy.  Right now, the owner of a solar or wind energy project … Read More

Is Today’s Energy Policy “Saving the Buggy Whip”?

Date: 20 Apr 2012 | posted in: Energy, Energy Self Reliant States | 0 Facebooktwitterredditmail

The editor’s column from the March 2012 edition of Public Utilities Fortnightly describes how policy inertia can hamper distributed renewable energy development.  To illustrate, Michael T. Burr draws on the history of the automobile: When the first Model-Ts sputtered down the street, few people could’ve imagined the remarkable transformations they’d bring. Instead, they only saw a … Read More

Welcome to the new Energy Self-Reliant States

Date: 20 Apr 2012 | posted in: Energy, Energy Self Reliant States | 1 Facebooktwitterredditmail

ILSR Senior Researcher John Farrell launched the Energy Self-Reliant States blog in late 2010 to provide hard data and analysis on the economic and political advantages of focusing on distributed renewable energy and local ownership.  For a while, it lived off our website, due to technical and aesthetic limitations. Today, we’re happy to repatriate the blog.  … Read More

Watch: Ontario’s Feed-in Tariff Program is a Good Investment

Date: 16 Apr 2012 | posted in: Energy, Energy Self Reliant States | 0 Facebooktwitterredditmail

ILSR Senior Researcher John Farrell gave this presentation remotely to the Ontario Power Perspectives conference on April 16, 2012.  He was supposed to be there in person, but he forgot to renew his passport.  The presentation highlights how Ontario’s “buy local” rule, bonuses for community ownership and focus on distributed generation make their feed-in tariff program … Read More

Net Metering a Cost to Utilities, or a Benefit?

Date: 11 Apr 2012 | posted in: Energy, Energy Self Reliant States | 1 Facebooktwitterredditmail

Update: A third-party study of net metering in California also found that solar customers provide more benefit than cost to the utility Utilities often claim that allowing customers to run their meter backward (by generating electricity on-site, e.g. from rooftop solar) can affect their bottom line because these customers don’t pay enough to cover the cost … Read More

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