UTILITIES TAKE SHINE TO SOLAR
RALEIGH, N.C. — The plunging cost of solar power is leading U.S. electric companies to capture more of the sun, just as President Trump is moving to boost coal and other fossil fuels.
Solar power represents only about 1 percent of the electricity U.S. utilities generate today, but that could grow substantially as major electric utilities move into smaller-scale solar farming, a niche developed by local cooperatives and nonprofits.
It is both an opportunity and a defensive maneuver: Sunshinecapturing technology has become so cheap, so quickly, that utilities are moving to preserve their core business against competition from household solar panels.
“Solar growth is so extensive and has so much momentum behind it that we’re at the point where you can’t put the genie back in the bottle,” said Jeffrey R.S. Brownson, a Pennsylvania State University professor who studies solar adoption. “You either learn how to work with this new medium, solar energy, or you’re going to face increasing conflicts.” The transition away from coalburning power plants now seems unstoppable, even if Trump scraps rules requiring utilities to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The average lifetime cost for utility-scale wind and solar generation in the U.S. is now cheaper than coal or nuclear and comparable to natural gas, according to financial advisory firm Lazard, which compared the fuel costs without their federal tax subsidies.
Wind and solar were expected to account for about two-thirds of the new electricity generation capacity added to the nation’s power grid in 2016, outpacing fossilfuel expansion for a third straight year, according to the U.S. Energy Department.
And even though big investorowned utilities operate as legal monopolies in many states, the bill-lowering appeal of rooftop solar for many homeowners could eventually threaten their ability to finance and manage the power grids.
These trends help explain why utilities are increasingly adopting a model called “community solar,” or “shared solar,” which involves customers agreeing to buy or lease solar panels on large arrays built for the utility, or to buy the power they produce.
Investor-owned utilities now back about 20 percent of the country’s community solar programs across 32 states, and represent about 70 percent of the potential output, said Dan Chwastyk of the Smart Electric Power Alliance, a group providing utilities information about shifting into clean-energy technologies.
Charlotte-based Duke Energy Corp., the largest electricity company in the United States, this year plans to launch a community solar program in South Carolina and seek regulatory permission to do the same in North Carolina, Florida, Kentucky, Ohio and Indiana.
Minneapolis-based Xcel Energy Inc., Topeka, Kan.,-based Westar Energy, and California’s three largest investor-owned utilities are among other power companies moving into community solar.
At the moment, switching from coal-fired power plants to natural gas is a cheaper way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, said Stanford University economist Frank Wolak. But utilities also need to hold on to their customers as solar power becomes more popular, said Wolak, who directs Stanford’s Program on Energy and Sustainable Development.
“If a customer signs up for community solar, we get the money,” he said. “With rooftop solar, that money is going to the solar installer.”