Big Oil looks to Texas in solar moves

BP and Total projects would help the state become No. 1

European oil giants BP and Total are investing heavily in solar power as they prepare for what many experts believe will be a low-carbon future.

French oil major Total on Thursday said it inked a deal with leading solar company 174 Power Global to build a dozen solar projects nationally, including five in Texas over the coming years.

Its U.K.-rival, BP’s joint venture Lighthouse BP, this week said it is investing $1 billion in new solar projects nationally, including two in Texas.

“I am confident that this will pave the way to more opportunities in the U.S. renewables and storage market,” Julien Pouget, Total’s renewables director, said in a statement Thursday.

The solar deals by two of the largest oil companies in the world is yet another sign of the energy transition from fossil fuels to renewable

energy. BP and Total last year set goals to become net-zero emissions companies by 2050 by increasing investments in wind and solar projects and reducing oil and gas production over time.

Total is rebuilding its energy portfolio so that renewables and electricity will become up to 40 percent of its sales by 2050. The company generates about 7 gigawatts of power from renewable energy, enough to power 2.1 million homes. By 2025, it plans to increase by fivefold its renewable power generation, to 35 gigawatts, enough to power 10.5 million

homes. Total’s planned solar projects in the U.S. will produce 1.6 gigawatts.

BP also has moved aggressively to meet its net-zero ambitions. The company over the past year has sold its petrochemicals business, acquired an Indiana wind farm and partnered with Norway based Equinor to develop four wind projects off the coast of New York and Massachusetts.

Lightsource BP, a global solar company in which BP has a 50 percent stake, recently began commercial operation of its largest solar project in North Texas. The 260-megawatt Impact Solar project in Lamar County northwest of Dallas will power more than 41,000 homes. The $250 million solar

farm is the first of three solar projects Lightsource BP plans to operate in Texas in the coming years.

Texas is an attractive market for solar companies because of its abundant and affordable land, flat topography, sunny climate, robust transmission system and deregulated electricity grid, said Kevin Smith, Lightsource BP’s CEO in the Americas.

“Texas has been a very strong market for us,” Smith said. “Obviously, there are lots of sunny areas in California, Arizona and Nevada, but I think Texas has the attributes certainly to move into the top few states in the U.S., and potentially have the most solar in the U.S.”

Texas is already the nation’s

top producer of oil and wind energy, but solar is picking up steam statewide. The state has the nation’s second highest number of solar installations annually, behind only California. Within five years, some predict that Texas could become the top solar energy producer nationally, said Raj Prabhu, CEO of Mercom Capital Group, an Austinbased clean energy research firm.

“Texas is No. 1 for oil and gas, No. 1 for wind, and we could be No. 1 for solar soon,” Prabhu said. “We’re No. 1 in energy.”