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Posts from the ‘Electricity’ Category

Feb 16

Munich Re Sees $658 Million in Renewable Energy Insurance Sales

Feb. 15 (Bloomberg) — Munich Re, the world’s largest reinsurer, may generate 500 million euros ($658 million) in annual revenue within five years from insuring renewable energy projects, including protecting against the risk that their solar suppliers become insolvent.

If solar module output falls below guaranteed levels and the manufacturer is unable to meet liabilities because of insolvency, Munich Re will protect the project investor, management board member Thomas Blunck said.

via Munich Re Sees $658 Million in Renewable Energy Insurance Sales – Businessweek.

Feb 15

Hawaii Asks Some Big Questions About Solar Penetration

In an annual report to the Public Utilities Commission, Hawaii’s utility Hawaii Electric Company (HECO) noted there were increased costs to ratepayers as the result of a net metering policy put in place to drive the growth of rooftop solar.

The increase to ratepayers, added to cover the rise in the fixed cost of grid operations resulting from the use of net metering and more solar, was 30 cents per month. But the initial news on that increase misplaced the decimal point and reported it as $3.00 per month.

That’s not a lot of money, but it was enough to bring forth some controversy over how much of a rate increase utility customers must bear for adding rooftop solar and other renewables.

via Hawaii Asks Some Big Questions About Solar Penetration : Greentech Media.

Feb 15

How Distributed Solar Can Reduce Electricity Prices

What if installing more solar could reduce electricity prices? It’s already happening in Germany, world leader in solar power, and it’s likely to happen in the U.S., too.

Right now the idea of solar reducing electricity prices seems silly. After all, when subsidies aren’t factored in, the cost of residential solar will be higher than residential retail electricity prices in all but 3 states until after 2016.

via How Distributed Solar Can Reduce Electricity Prices | john-farrell-ilsr.

Feb 15

Lights Out for Some Coal Plants

First there were six. Now there’s three more. What’s going on in the coal-fired utility business? FirstEnergy of Ohio plans to close by September those 9 units, which supply as much as 13 percent of the company’s electricity.

Some call it an Environmental Protection Agency onslaught. Others call it for what it is — environmental improvements that are long overdue. Indeed, utilities are now forced to choose whether to retrofit or to retire their old coal plants that do not have modern pollution controls. It’s expensive to go back and fix those that are as old as 50, or ones that have outlived their expected days on this earth.

via Lights Out for Some Coal Plants – Forbes.

Feb 10

PACE Financing on the Rebound

Property-assessed clean energy, or PACE, financing has had a rough ride over the past few years, but it’s poised for a comeback. On the home front, we’ve got federal regulators considering ways to unblock a financing model that could spur billions of dollars in residential energy retrofits. And on the commercial side, we’ve got some showcase projects that could unlock a market even bigger in scope.

That’s not bad, considering the death many analysts were predicting for the PACE model in 2010. That’s when the Federal Housing Finance Agency told mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac that they couldn’t underwrite mortgages for homes that sought to pay back home energy efficiency upgrades, solar panels and other projects through property taxes.

via PACE Financing on the Rebound : Greentech Media.

Feb 10

Federal Research Lab Concludes China’s Costs to Produce and Deliver Solar to U.S. Market Exceed Those of U.S. Producers

WASHINGTON–(BUSINESS WIRE)–The Coalition for American Solar Manufacturing (CASM), a group of seven U.S. solar manufacturers representing more than 150 employers of more than 14,650 workers, is heralding a revised research presentation from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, posted on the NREL website today. The presentation concludes Chinese production of crystalline silicon solar technology for the U.S. market costs more than U.S. production for the domestic market, when the costs of shipping are included.

via Federal Research Lab Concludes China’s Costs to Produce and Deliver Solar to U.S. Market Exceed Those of U.S. Producers | Solar Energy News.

Feb 10

Assessing the Risks in Solar Project Development

Over the next four years, 5.7 GW of utility-scale solar PV projects is expected to be built in the U.S. and another 1.3 GW in Canada for a total of 7 GW. Both amounts represent a significantly larger volume than what has been installed to date and is expected to be the dominating type of solar installation for that period of time. Yet, 7 GW only represent a fraction of the total capacity of large-scale solar PV projects initiated and under development in the same period, illustrating that solar project development still is a high-risk undertaking.

The reasons so few projects materialize are many; ranging from inexperience at the hand of the developer, to site specific problems, technical issues, regulatory problems and permitting issues — all affect the financial and technical viability of a project. In the end, failure to develop projects at some point in the development process comes at considerable cost for the project developer as well as the solar industry as a whole

via Assessing the Risks in Solar Project Development | Renewable Energy News Article.

Feb 10

Bombshell Study: High Methane Emissions Measured Over Gas Field “May Offset Climate Benefits of Natural Gas”

How much methane leaks during the entire lifecycle of unconventional gas has emerged as a key question in the fracking debate. Natural gas is mostly methane (CH4). And methane is a far more potent greenhouse gas than (CO2), which is released when any hydrocarbon, like natural gas, is burned.

Even without a high-leakage rate for shale gas, we know that “Absent a Serious Price for Global Warming Pollution, Natural Gas Is A Bridge To Nowhere.”

But the leakage rate does matter. A major 2011 study by Tom Wigley of the Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) concluded:

The most important result, however, in accord with the above authors, is that, unless leakage rates for new methane can be kept below 2%, substituting gas for coal is not an effective means for reducing the magnitude of future climate change.

via Bombshell Study: High Methane Emissions Measured Over Gas Field “May Offset Climate Benefits of Natural Gas” | ThinkProgress.

Feb 10

The Next Wave In Renewable Energy From the Ocean

MOTORING ACROSS THE PUGET Sound, Reenst Lesemann spots a yellow, barnacle-encrusted contraption bobbing on the wind-whipped waters off Seattle. Called the SeaRay, it’s the prototype of a device that Lesemann’s startup, Columbia Power Technologies, is betting can help transform wave energy from a long-running science experiment into the next renewable energy bonanza. “I have never seen a multibillion-dollar market where the customers are literally waiting on the technology,” says Lesemann, a former venture capitalist.

Indeed. A new government-sponsored study has found that the oceans surrounding the U.S. contain enough energy to potentially supply more than half the nation’s electricity demand. Even with the limits of today’s technology, scientists concluded, there’s sufficient recoverable energy offshore – some 1,170 terawatt-hours a year in all – to keep a third of the country humming. More energy crashes annually onto the West Coast, for instance, than California uses in a year.

via The Next Wave In Renewable Energy From the Ocean – Forbes.

Feb 8

Passive Loss Rules and You

As my colleague Mike Mendelsohn has noted in several analyses, the relatively constrained tax equity market may limit the amount of investment flowing to renewable energy projects. [1] [2] To help bolster the supply of tax equity, high-net-worth individuals could moonlight as renewable energy investors much in same way a corporation would. However, unlike corporations, individual investors are subject to passive loss rules that will likely mitigate the value of federal incentives for renewable energy projects.

Passive loss rules can restrict renewable energy investment in two ways:

The rules stipulate that individuals, as passive investors, can only apply the tax credits or depreciation to other forms of passive income. In the context of renewable energy projects, most individual investors who are not actively participating in the day-to-day operation and management decisions of the project would likely be considered as passive by the Internal Revenue Service. [3]

Most individuals do not earn that much passive income. Qualifying passive income is generally limited to either (1) rental income or (2) income from a project in which the investor does not materially participate either in the management or normal business activity.[4]

via Passive Loss Rules and You | Renewable Energy Project Finance.

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