Minnesota clean energy and economic development officials say a Canadian solar manufacturer’s planned expansion in the state shows the impact of federal climate incentives for domestic production. 

Pete Wyckoff, assistant commissioner of federal and state initiatives for the Minnesota Department of Commerce, said Heliene’s announcement that it plans to onshore solar cell manufacturing in partnership with an Indian supplier shows the Inflation Reduction Act “is doing what it is designed to do, which is to provide incentives to encourage every step in the solar manufacturing process to occur domestically.” 

In late July, Heliene said it had reached a joint venture agreement with Premier Energies, India’s second-largest solar cell manufacturing company, to build a solar cell manufacturing facility somewhere in the Twin Cities. Heliene also has a plant in northern Minnesota, where it assembles solar panel modules using imported cells from Premier Energies.

Several U.S. factories assemble solar panel modules — think of the rectangular boxes you’d see installed on a rooftop. Almost all of these domestic manufacturers, though, depend on imported solar cells — the half-foot square slices of silicon that actually do the work of converting sunlight to electricity.  

The Inflation Reduction Act prompted a flurry of announcements related to domestic solar cell production, but its viability here remains unclear, Renewable Energy World recently reported. Multiple companies have already retracted plans for U.S. solar cell factories, citing market challenges.

Meeting installer demands

Heliene CEO Martin Pochtaruk said its planned solar cell plant is meant to meet clients’ demand for modules with higher levels of domestic content, which allow project developers to claim more lucrative incentives. After solar owners receive a standard 30% tax credit for projects, they can add another 10% by using modules with equipment made in the United States.

“Strong solar cell manufacturing offers solar developers a higher percentage of U.S.-made domestic content components for their projects, reduces reliance on imports, and releases stress on our supply chain,” Pochtaruk said.

He said working with Premier on establishing an American beachhead that could employ more than 200 workers makes sense because the Inflation Reduction Act rewards solar panels made primarily with parts made in the U.S. solar cells.

Solar developers must use panels with a domestic content of 40% or more for the bonus, and the threshold will increase to 55% in 2026. 

In August, Heliene agreed to a multi-year contract with NorSun to supply low-carbon wafers — one of the building blocks of solar cells — for all the company’s solar panels starting in 2026. 

Heliene has also announced a partnership with UGE, a community and commercial solar and battery storage developer, to provide panels that meet the requirements of the Domestic Content Investment Tax Credit (ITC) Bonus. 

Heliene said in a press release that it would manage construction, finances, supply chain logistics, regulatory oversight, and human resources. Premier will provide cell technology engineering, manufacturing expertise, supply-side agreements, and raw material vendor relationships.  

Pochtaruk said Heliene’s commitment to buy material from Premier Energies and NorSun was instrumental in their ability to finance the new factories. He asked both to try to open in 2026 when the content bonus requires more American-made content.

Jeremy Kalin, a Minneapolis attorney who works with several solar developers, said his clients are seeking panel suppliers with enough content to take the additional 10% tax credit. Manufacturers must provide a guarantee that the panels reach the threshold of having at least 55% of the panels’ components American-made. 

“Once they meet that requirement, they will see a flood of business,” Kalin said.  

Could Minnesota be a solar manufacturing center?

Minnesota Solar Energy Industries Association business development and communications director Abbi Morgan said the company’s presence “is huge and something we’re excited about because Minnesota is often overlooked when it comes to clean energy.”

So far, though, Heliene’s Minnesota operations have yet to attract other solar manufacturers. Morgan said one of the association’s members, a German firm, opened a factory in Arizona. At least among the association’s more than 170 members, plenty have expressed interest in buying panels from Heliene.

“There are a lot of members who ask about Heliene, but we’ve heard they have a long waiting list even though they expanded their factory in Mountain Iron,” Morgan said.

After securing a $3.5 million state loan package in 2018, Heliene began manufacturing and assembling panels in a once-shuttered solar module plant in Mountain Iron. The former plant, Silicon Energy, failed despite state investments of millions of dollars.

The plant is in a business park created to attract green energy companies across the street from a taconite mine. Two years ago, the company spent $21 million to triple the production space through an addition to the plant. Heliene spent $9.5 million to pay for the expansion and received most of the rest through state loans and a county grant.

Now, the company has shifted attention to adding capacity in central Minnesota, where it will begin developing two solar module manufacturing lines in an existing 227,000-square-foot warehouse in Rogers, a burgeoning exurb northwest of Minneapolis.

Before preparing the warehouse for solar production, Heliene is waiting to hear whether the project will receive money from the Minnesota Investment Fund (MIF) and Job Creation Fund (JCF). State officials were expected to make an announcement in September.

Rogers Community Development Director Brett Angell said Heliene will fit into the city’s growing reputation as a hub for sustainable enterprises. The company plans to employ at least 180 people and spend $16 million on building improvements and equipment.

“Additionally, (Heliene) would continue to add to the growing segment of sustainable manufacturers within the community as the city currently is home to multiple plastic recycling companies,” Angell said.

Heliene has not selected a site for the solar cell manufacturing plant or provided details on how much investment and employment it will create. Pochtaruk said the building will be significantly larger than the solar module plant.

Federal incentives spur solar panel company to try onshoring its supply chain in Minnesota is an article from Energy News Network, a nonprofit news service covering the clean energy transition. If you would like to support us please make a donation.

This monthly newsletter provides updates on Ohio’s ongoing utility corruption scandal. Was this forwarded to you? Click here to subscribe.

FirstEnergy’s utility customers took heavy hits from severe thunderstorms and tornadoes last month. Nearly half a million of its Ohio utility customers lost power, with extended outages causing many to lose food and incur other expenses in addition to property damage due to the extreme weather. 

All of the company’s utility customers can also expect hits from higher energy bills next year after FirstEnergy’s pending rate case ends. On July 31, the company asked Ohio regulators to let it double the increased charges sought — from roughly $94 million per year to $190.3 million annually.

Yet state regulators still have not resolved multiple FirstEnergy cases involving millions of dollars and issues related to House Bill 6, the 2019 nuclear and coal bailout law at the heart of Ohio’s ongoing corruption scandal. And none of those cases will be decided before voters cast their ballots this fall.

Other recent developments include: 

• The State of Ohio settled potential criminal charges against FirstEnergy for $20 million, without stating how the figure was arrived at or making any provision for restitution to Ohio ratepayers.
• Federal prosecutors urged the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals to uphold former Ohio House Speaker Larry Householder’s criminal conviction and 20-year sentence.
• Ohio regulators approved more than $100 million in challenged expenses for two 1950s-era coal plants for which subsidies are mandated by HB 6.

In the dark

Grid reliability is back in the spotlight after tornadoes and severe thunderstorms knocked out power to approximately 495,000 of FirstEnergy’s Ohio utility customers on August 6.

FirstEnergy Ohio President Torrence Hinton and other company executives provided a briefing on the company’s response to the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio after its September 4 meeting. “We haven’t had this amount of customers out for about 30 years,” Hinton said.

Restoring power took roughly a week, with outages lasting more than three days for more than 100,000 of those customers, data from the company show. 

The outages likely won’t count against the utilities’ reliability requirements for this year because of the extreme nature of the storms. 

Some Ohio lawmakers like House Rep. Dick Stein, R-Norwalk, have already expressed concern about reliability, although they have framed it as a consequence of retiring coal-fired power plants and have called for more electricity from fossil fuels or nuclear energy. 

However, the vast majority of electric grid reliability problems stem from bad weather and distribution issues. Those problems are likely to worsen as infrastructure ages and fossil fuel-driven climate change makes extreme weather more common.

“Without immediate and meaningful action, climate change will continue to cause extreme weather and drive up costs for all Ohioans,” 14 Democratic Ohio House representatives wrote in an August 14 letter, calling for regulators to address the effectiveness and reliability of the state’s current energy strategies, which are heavily depending on fossil fuels and nuclear power.

Read more:

Despite millions spent on service upgrades, Ohio utilities still miss reliability marks (Energy News Network)

About 1,000 power outages linger 7 days after storms (FOX 8 News)

Doubling increased charges

FirstEnergy asked the PUCO this summer to let it double its proposed increase for rates and riders for its three Ohio utilities to $190.3 million per year, compared with the $94 million sought just two months earlier.

The requested increase is “primarily due to lower current revenues, higher operating expenses and higher rate base balances” than estimated, said Santino Fanelli, FirstEnergy’s director for Ohio rates and regulatory affairs, in testimony filed with the PUCO on July 31.

Fanelli also said the requested increase reflects the use of actual cost and revenue data instead of estimates for the first five months of the rate case’s test year. A pending bill would give utilities more leeway in using estimates, and some advocates worry companies might pad them on the high side.

In late June the PUCO selected Blue Ridge Consulting Services to help it review financial data, management policies and other information. The commission’s staff will then likely prepare a report with recommendations. Ratepayers will also have a chance to comment at local public hearings, which have not yet been scheduled but will likely include a virtual session.

Read more:

FirstEnergy companies asking Ohio regulators for rate increases (WUXU)

Ohio ratemaking reform bill would give more favors to utilities, critics say (Energy News Network)

Slap on the wrist?

FirstEnergy agreed to pay $20 million to settle its state criminal liability related to HB 6, but it’s unclear how lawyers for the utility, the Ohio Attorney General’s office and the Summit County prosecutor’s office arrived at the number. 

The amount is just under one-third of the bribes the company admitted to paying when it settled federal criminal charges against it in July 2021. The law’s nuclear bailouts would have been $1.3 billion if they hadn’t been stayed and then repealed.

The agreement with the state acknowledges the company’s cooperation but does not require any compensation to ratepayers, said Ashley Brown, a former PUCO commissioner.

Spokesperson Steve Irwin at the Ohio Attorney General’s office framed the settlement as “an important step in bringing the disgraced corporate leaders who used their positions of power to betray FirstEnergy’s ratepayers and employees and the people of Ohio to account for their crimes.” Irwin noted that the company is required to provide evidence, access to witnesses and testimony in the pending cases against former FirstEnergy executives Chuck Jones and Michael Dowling and in a civil proceeding relating to HB 6. “FirstEnergy today is not the company it was five years ago,” he added, noting steps taken to reform the company’s internal ethics program.

FirstEnergy President and CEO Brian Tierney echoed the theme in a press release, saying the company is “a stronger organization today.” 

Others are more critical.

“It is really disappointing to see the Ohio Attorney General’s office let FirstEnergy off the hook for its crimes with what amounted to more of a wink-wink than a slap on the wrist,” said Dave Anderson, policy and communications manager for the Energy and Policy Institute. He contrasted the August settlement with the potential remedies spelled out in the Ohio Attorney General’s initial civil complaint in a 2020 case, where potential punishments included corporate dissolution of FirstEnergy and penalties of triple the damages caused by allegedly wrongful actions.

Read more:

FirstEnergy to pay $20M, avoid criminal charges in state pay-to-play investigation (Akron Beacon Journal)

Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost settles with FirstEnergy for $20 million (Ohio Capital Journal)

Regulatory cases continue

Ohio voters can’t expect a resolution to any of FirstEnergy’s four HB 6-related regulatory cases before casting their votes this fall. Nineteen candidates on the ballot for Ohio’s General Assembly are among those who voted for HB 6 in 2019.

An audit in one case isn’t due before the end of September, and no date for an evidentiary hearing has been set. Two other cases about how FirstEnergy spent money from two bill riders won’t get an evidentiary hearing until next February.

A fourth regulatory case about corporate separation is set to start its hearing on October 9, when early voting will be underway. That date may move, however, because several depositions won’t take place until November and December. Depositions are sessions where witnesses answer lawyers’ questions under oath before a hearing or trial.

Questions in some of those depositions will likely follow up on information from recently produced documents. Possible topics also include why FirstEnergy fired various individuals besides former executives Jones and Dowling in the wake of Householder and others’ arrests in 2020.

Read more: 

FirstEnergy exec was fired amid bribery probe after his daughter pitched a $44k/month contract, records show (Cleveland.com)

FirstEnergy’s chief ethics officer knew about $4.3 million payment the company said was a bribe (Cleveland.com)

Rubber stamping?

Ohio regulators have approved more than $100 million in challenged 2020 expenses for two 1950s-era coal plants. HB 6 lets the plants’ Ohio utility owners pass costs on to ratepayers through 2030. By then the total subsidies could be around $1 billion, according to RunnerStone, a consultant for the Ohio Manufacturers’ Association.

“Consumers once again got stuck with the bill,” said Ohio Consumers’ Counsel Maureen Willis when the August 21 ruling came out.

The PUCO found that while the auditor, London Economics International, made several recommendations and conclusions critical of the coal plants’ practices and spending, the firm hadn’t come straight out and said any amount should be disallowed.

Paul Arbaje, an energy analyst for the Union of Concerned Scientists, said the ruling “sets a disturbing precedent. Coal-fired electricity is not only terribly destructive to our climate and public health, but it’s also completely uneconomical and has been for a long time.”

Higher capacity prices in the PJM grid region will take effect next June and could offset some of next year’s coal subsidies under HB 6. However, critics say the old plants will still be a bad deal for Ohioans. And higher capacity prices will affect wholesale electricity prices across the regional grid footprint, likely raising energy expenses overall.

Read more:

Ohio coal plant subsidies still a bad deal for ratepayers despite growing generation demand, experts say (Energy News Network)

HB 6 coal plant charges mount up again in Ohio (Energy News Network)

Coal company got big payback from HB 6 (Energy News Network)

Federal court filings

Briefing has been completed in lobbyist Matt Borges’ appeal from his federal criminal conviction alongside former Ohio House speaker Larry Householder last year. The court has not yet scheduled oral argument.

Federal prosecutors filed their brief in the Householder case on August 26, arguing that the trial court got both Householder’s conviction and his 20-year sentence right. Three groups also filed a friend-of-the-court brief on August 30, countering Householder’s argument that bribes were campaign donations and a form of speech protected under the Constitution.

“The First Amendment provides no protection for the corrupt and knowing exchange of campaign contributions for official acts,” wrote lawyers for the Campaign Legal Center, the Environmental Law & Policy Center and the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law.

A July court filing in FirstEnergy’s deferred prosecution agreement case acknowledged the company has performed its obligations under that 2021 settlement, which resulted in a $230 million penalty. FirstEnergy must continue to cooperate in any other criminal cases the federal government brings relating to facts stated in that HB 6 case. However, the federal government has yet to bring criminal charges against any current or former FirstEnergy executives who allegedly made the bribes.

A separate case at the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals involves FirstEnergy’s challenge to Judge Algenon Marbley’s May 6 ruling that the company must produce its internal investigation to lawyers in shareholder litigation. The appeals court docket includes friend-of-the-court briefs filed by several law firms and a malpractice insurance carrier, expressing concern about whether the ruling could erode attorney-client privilege.

Read more:

On appeal, DOJ affirms ex-Ohio House Speaker Householder took FirstEnergy’s $60 million ‘secret deal’ (Cleveland.com)

Scandal-tainted FirstEnergy demands appeal of ‘shockwave’ privilege ruling (Reuters)

FirstEnergy backed by dozens of law firms in ‘shockwave’ privilege appeal (Reuters)

HB 6 Updates: More bill charges on the way while cases continue is an article from Energy News Network, a nonprofit news service covering the clean energy transition. If you would like to support us please make a donation.

Illinois has $30 million in incentives available for solar installations on multi-family buildings. 

So far, though, the state program has not received any applications for such projects, according to Jan Gudell, Illinois Solar for All associate director at Elevate, the organization tasked with running the state program. 

In urban areas like Chicago, residents of environmental justice and lower-income neighborhoods are highly likely to live in multi-family residential buildings where it is extremely difficult to install rooftop solar. 

There is little incentive for a landlord to invest in solar that will provide cost savings to the tenants, and rooftops may need significant upgrades to handle solar. In condo buildings, homeowners association bureaucracy and other concerns must be navigated.

There’s also a lesser-known logistical and structural barrier — if solar is to be channeled to individual residential units behind the meter, a separate solar system is essentially needed for each unit — with separate inverters and wiring.

“That’s a lot of hardware, space and cost,” said Aliya Bagewadi, US director of strategic partnerships for Allume Energy, an Australian startup company that says it can address at least this part of the puzzle, by sending energy to individual units with only one inverter and system. 

The company has served thousands of customers in Australia, New Zealand and Europe with its SolShare technology. Now it is rolling out in the U.S., in sunny southern states as well as Illinois, because of the state’s robust solar incentives. 

“It’s inherently an energy equity issue,” said Bagewadi, who is based in Chicago. “We know [multi-family building residents] are much more likely to be lower-income, longer-term renters. We want to make sure those savings flow to people who can really benefit the most.”

Direct benefits 

Illinois isn’t alone in the lack of multi-family solar arrays. Solar developers and advocates have long noted the challenge nationwide, especially for affordable multi-family rental buildings. A 2022 study by Berkeley lab noted that in 2021, about 3% of solar installed in the U.S. was on multi-family buildings, mostly owner-occupied condos. 

“Solar may be a non-starter in a rental multi-family property because the owner may be looking at a complex, expensive and time-consuming process, where they would have to consider the design, permitting, installation, interconnection, and cost for multiple systems,” said Gudell. “For many property owners, this may be unaffordable and unmanageable.” 

A 2018 study by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory found that the majority of potential capacity for new solar serving low- and moderate-income customers is on renter-occupied multi-family rooftops. California passed a law in 2015 specifically to address the dearth of solar on multi-family buildings, promising to invest up to $1 billion by 2031.

There are typically several ways to handle rooftop solar on multi-family buildings. 

In rental properties, the building owner can own the array, and use the energy to power common areas, like hallways, a pool or gym. Owners can also allocate a portion of the energy savings to tenants, by charging an amenity fee or otherwise collecting some revenue themselves. 

Alternately, the energy can all be sent back to the grid, in areas with viable net metering policies, and the compensation can be shared with tenants or among condo owners, often referred to as virtual net metering. Community solar offers a similar situation — where the solar isn’t onsite at all, but residents can subscribe to partake in savings. 

Solar advocates, developers, lenders, and policymakers have all been working at state and federal levels to improve opportunities for virtual net metering and community solar. 

These arrangements, however, can still be unattractive or impossible depending on state and utility policy. Community solar isn’t even legal in some states, and virtual net metering depends on utility participation. 

The California law requiring solar on new multi-family construction up to three stories high exempts areas served by utilities that don’t offer virtual net metering.

SolShare avoids these challenges by sending electricity directly from the solar array to individual users, without involving utilities or the grid.

“You can do behind-the-meter with direct benefit to tenants,” said Bagewadi. “We’re physically pushing the electrons to multiple meters.”

Possibilities 

Allume partners with solar installers and developers to help deploy rooftop solar on multi-family buildings, including by working with landlords to design financial structures that benefit both the building owner and tenants. In some cases, Allume acts as the solar developer itself. 

With SolShare, a building owner or manager can allocate energy from a shared solar system, based on unit square footage, in equal amounts, or however they choose. 

Where the technology is deployed in Australia and the UK, energy can be sent to different units on demand, Bagewadi explained. In the U.S., the rollout in Florida and Mississippi is being done with preset amounts that can be changed with 24 hours notice. 

An Allume case study from a 64-unit Orlando apartment building with SolShare notes that a 392-kilowatt rooftop system resulted in savings of almost $100 per month for each unit, with electricity purchased from the grid reduced by almost 60%. While the idea is for residents to use solar behind the meter, excess solar can be sent to the grid. Adding an on-site battery to the mix lets residents use all the power on-site behind the meter, and makes solar power available when the grid is down.

Solar advocates hope the EPA’s $7 billion commitment to the federal equity-focused Solar for All program — separate from Illinois’s state program — will “further unlock multi-family solar,” in Bagewadi’s words.

Gudell said Elevate and other experts know there are many Illinoisans living in multi-family rental buildings that would qualify to have solar installed through Illinois Solar for All. They hope policy and technology evolve to match the available funding. 

“We’ll need a solution that addresses the split incentive problem for rental situations, where the building owner cannot or will not subsidize solar for tenants; and the complexity of bringing solar to multiple electrical accounts at one building,” Gudell said. 

“Adoption of a technology that allows for a single system to be split into shares, for use by multiple electrical account holders, could help in that it would simplify the design, permitting and installation process.”

Startup pitches new model to unlock solar for multi-family buildings, in Illinois and beyond is an article from Energy News Network, a nonprofit news service covering the clean energy transition. If you would like to support us please make a donation.

The leader of a local anti-solar energy group admitted to Ohio regulators last week that a well-connected natural gas executive is among the group’s largest donors.

The testimony by Jared Yost, founder of Knox Smart Development, offered the fullest view yet of the group’s ties to fossil fuel interests, undercutting its claims to be a “grassroots” advocate for local farmers and other residents.

“It changes the story quite a bit,” said David Pomerantz, executive director of the Energy and Policy Institute, a watchdog group that recently published a report on the fossil fuel industry’s long history of using money and misinformation to stoke local opposition to renewable energy projects.

Knox Smart Development emerged late last year as a high-profile local opponent of the proposed 120 megawatt Frasier Solar project, located near Mount Vernon, Ohio. Questions emerged about its funding source after it hosted a town hall meeting at a local theater with complimentary food and drinks for approximately 500 attendees.

Yost disclosed during an Ohio Power Siting Board hearing last week that one of its largest donors is Tom Rastin, the former vice president of Ariel Corporation, which makes compressors for the oil and gas industry. The Washington Post reported last year that Rastin is also a leader of The Empowerment Alliance, a dark money nonprofit that advocates for the natural gas industry.

Yost said he did not have knowledge about Rastin’s work with The Empowerment Alliance, but said the fossil fuel group provided “non-financial” resources to Knox Smart Development to help oppose the Frasier Solar project.

Yost denied being swayed by corporate interests and said his group has not received corporate funding. “The Empowerment Alliance has nothing to do with me or [Knox Smart Development],” he told the Energy News Network via email. “I have reached out to them and asked questions on a couple of occasions, as can anyone, and as I have done of others.”

Multiple links

When asked in his hearing testimony if Knox Smart Development was “funded by any individuals or entities having any interest or providing any goods or services to the fossil fuel industry,” Yost answered, “No, not directly to the best of my knowledge.”

On cross-examination, however, Yost admitted Rastin was one of the group’s largest funders. Yost is a former IT specialist at Ariel Corporation, and his work supported Rastin’s department. Rastin’s wife, Karen Buchwald Wright, is a former president and CEO of Ariel and continues as board chair. Her son Alex Wright succeeded her in 2021 as CEO.

A July 2024 report from the Energy and Policy Institute includes links to recently produced public records. A September 2023 email shows Rastin was slated to speak to the Ohio General Assembly’s Business First caucus in October. The email attached a copy of Rastin’s biography with The Empowerment Alliance logo on top.

Mitch Given, who was identified in a meeting with Ohio lawmakers last year as The Empowerment Alliance’s Ohio director, spoke at a Knox Smart Development town hall meeting last November. There he was introduced as someone who travels across the state to help farmers and others “find their voice” and push back against solar projects.

The emcee for that town hall event, Tom Whatman, is a chief strategist for Majority Strategies. The Empowerment Alliance’s Form 990 filing for 2023 shows it paid the political consulting firm more than $620,000 that year, making it the group’s highest paid contractor for five years in a row.

Yost last week also discussed a dinner meeting last summer about the Frasier Solar project where the attendees included Rastin, Given, Whatman, Ariel employee Trina Trainor, and Lanny Spaulding. Spaulding is listed as a contact person for The Empowerment Alliance on an Ohio lobbyist registration form. Yost’s dad and others also attended. Yost had earlier said he did not organize the meeting.

Yost denied being influenced by The Empowerment Alliance or other corporate interests.

“No one has ever tried to direct me in any way with my opposition to this project. I am nobody’s ‘puppet’,” Yost told the Energy News Network. “I am doing this for me, my family, my township, and my neighbors.” He also said it was “insulting that people try to question my intentions, integrity, and intelligence. Frankly, it hurts.”

Misinformation at work

Nolan Rutschilling, managing director of energy policy for the Ohio Environmental Council, said arguments presented by behind-the-scenes special interests can be more believable if they seem to come from a grassroots effort. 

“People trust their neighbors because they are often believed to not have any outside agenda other than the best interest of their community,” Rutschilling said. “Unfortunately, this allows misinformation to spread quickly, and communities have stopped renewable energy projects from moving forward.”

The stakes are significant, he said, because local public sentiment is among the factors the Ohio Power Siting Board considers in judging whether a project is in the public interest, along with statewide interests.

“If the fossil fuel industry wants to oppose solar projects, they should intervene in the open — not by amplifying misinformation in communities,” Rutschilling said.

“The Empowerment Alliance prefers to stoke fear in hopes of snuffing out perceived competition from clean, cheap, local renewable energy,” said Craig Adair, a vice president for Frasier Solar’s developer, Open Road Renewables. “As always, Frasier Solar stands ready and willing to address local residents’ legitimate concerns about potential impacts of solar development.”  

Statements at Knox Smart Development meetings and in ads have included multiple examples of misinformation. For example, Yost admitted during cross-examination he was unaware that a photo showing damaged solar panels was taken in St. Croix after a strong hurricane — a highly unlikely event in central Ohio. 

“This was intended to show what I believe could happen,” Yost said. 

Other examples include unsupported claims about solar panels and other components releasing toxic chemicals. Steve Goreham, a speaker at the group’s November 2023 town hall, made unsupported claims about climate change. Goreham also drew spurious correlations between electricity price rises and high levels of renewable energy in California and Texas. In fact, wildfires, extreme heat and transmission upgrades were the driving factors.

Misinformation was rife in opposition testimony people gave at three local public hearings held by the Ohio Power Siting Board in Knox County.

Half of more than 100 unique arguments made by project opponents at those hearings were not supported by the facts, said Heidi Gorovitz Robertson, a professor at Cleveland State University College of Law, in her August 22 expert testimony for the Ohio Environmental Council.

“In the aggregate, the arguments do not present credible or compelling opposition to the proposed project,” Robertson said.

Connections confirmed between ‘grassroots’ Ohio solar opposition and dark-money natural gas group is an article from Energy News Network, a nonprofit news service covering the clean energy transition. If you would like to support us please make a donation.

Xcel Energy is proposing a new approach to powering the grid in Minnesota.

The utility recently told state regulators it wants to build a network of solar-powered energy storage hubs, located strategically on its grid and linked with technology so they can be operated in concert with each other.

The result would be what’s known as a “virtual power plant.” By simultaneously discharging the batteries, for example, the collection of distributed resources can function similar to a conventional power plant.

It’s a solution some clean energy advocates have long pushed for as an alternative to larger, centrally located projects that are more reliant on long-distance transmission and create fewer local economic benefits. Xcel’s new embrace of the concept likely reflects the evolving economics of clean energy and the urgency to replace generation from retiring coal-fired power plants.

“I welcome our now-agreement about the importance of distributed energy resources in their future procurement plans,” said John Farrell, director of the Energy Democracy Initiative at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance.

Virtual power plants 101

Virtual power plants use sophisticated software and technology to aggregate energy from batteries, smart thermostats, electric vehicles, storage and other connected devices. The clean energy nonprofit RMI predicts virtual power plants nationally could reduce peak loads by 60 gigawatts and cut annual energy expenditures by $17 billion by 2030.   

Several utilities, as well as solar and storage companies, have developed virtual power plant programs around the country. Perhaps the best-known is National Grid’s ConnectedSolutions program in New England, which includes residential batteries, electric vehicle batteries, and thermostats.  

In May, Colorado Gov. Jared Polis signed legislation requiring Xcel Energy to create a virtual power plant plan in that state by next February. 

Xcel is pitching the Minnesota project on its own as part of its latest long-range resource plan. In a recent Public Utilities Commission filing, Xcel proposes combining 440 megawatts of solar power with 400 megawatts of battery storage at dispersed locations. Designed to be flexible, the program might add backup generation and energy efficiency measures in the future. 

A virtual power plant, Xcel said, would save ratepayers money, improve reliability, accelerate clean energy development, and reduce energy disparities by playing assets in underserved communities. The “new approach equips us to confidently meet incoming load growth, deliver unique customer and community value, and support economic development,” the company said in its filing.

Kevin Coss, a spokesperson for the company, said the proposal “is part of a larger plan to better serve the grid and our customers while meeting anticipated growth in energy demand. The program would grow our distributed energy resources as a complement to our existing plans for additional utility-scale renewable and firm dispatchable generation to advance the clean energy transition.”

Advocates reaction

Clean energy advocates say the approach could reduce Xcel’s need to build more infrastructure at a time when electricity demand continues to grow and its fleet of aging fossil fuel plants reach closure dates.

A recent study in Illinois suggested that pairing solar with storage could be the most economical and environmentally beneficial way to maintain grid reliability as the state transitions to 100% clean energy.

“Utilities always treated distributed energy resources as something that happened to them and that they had to figure out how to accommodate because they were being told to,” said Will Kenworthy, Vote Solar’s Midwest regulatory director. 

The company’s interest in more distributed resources could lead to a more flexible grid, one that helps mitigate substations congestion and allows it to store energy from wind farms for use during high-demand periods, Kenworthy said.

One area of disagreement between the utility and some clean energy advocates is who should own the facilities. Unlike in Colorado, Xcel is proposing to own the Minnesota solar and storage hubs itself, collecting money to build them — plus a rate of return — from ratepayers. 

That’s not the best deal for customers, and it prevents local communities and developers from being able to share the financial benefits of distributed energy, said Farrell, of the Energy Democracy Initiative. If Xcel owns the virtual power plant, the cost could be higher than they would be with an open, competitive process.

Farrell pointed to the recent opposition to an Xcel electric vehicle charging plan in which it sought to own all of the chargers. Convenience stores and gas stations argued Xcel had an unfair market advantage as the incumbent utility and would own too much of the state’s charging network. Xcel withdrew the proposal in 2023 after regulators reduced the charging network’s size.

As Xcel’s plan evolves, Farrell wants Xcel to allow businesses, homeowners, and aggregators to also participate by selling their battery capacity or demand response into the program.

The Minnesota Solar Energy Industries Association, which promotes battery storage, also takes a dim view of Xcel owning a virtual power plant.

“This is an area where competition would likely provide better service, lower cost and more choice to ratepayers,” said regulatory and policy affairs director Curtis Zaun. “Monopolies are not particularly good at providing the best service at a reasonable rate because that is inconsistent with their investors’ interests.”

Getting the details right

Virtual power plants are different than demand response, such as thermostat savings programs, in that they add value to the grid “without any change needed to the homeowner’s behavior,” said Amy Heart, senior vice president for policy at Sunrun, a home solar and storage company that participates in virtual power plants in the Northeast and in Texas, California, and Puerto Rico. 

Heart said the “devil is in the details” when creating a robust demand response program. A program in Arizona failed, she said, because of the underperformance of the single company it selected to aggregate resources.

Sunrun developed a virtual power plant in four New England states, enrolling more than 5,000 solar and storage customers to share their capacity on the grid. In the summer of 2022, Sunrun’s virtual power plant shared more than 1.8 gigawatt hours of electricity.

Typically, Sunrun customers agree under contract to share a portion of their battery backup 30 to 60 times annually for three hours or less for each event. The process is automated, with Sunrun’s software connecting to customer batteries and sending utilities power during high-demand times or predictable peak loads. Customers receive payment for the electricity provided.  

Heart said the best systems are open to individual customers and aggregators using different battery storage brands. Giving a virtual power plant “room to grow, breathe, and adapt will be important,” she added.

The Xcel virtual power plant proposal is part of the multi-year Upper Midwest Integrated Resource Plan, which regulators have been reviewing and will likely approve, with many changes, later this year.

In Minnesota, Xcel Energy looks to mimic power plant with solar and storage networks is an article from Energy News Network, a nonprofit news service covering the clean energy transition. If you would like to support us please make a donation.