Now that solar PPAs

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Lingyue Zhang Friday, 20 September 2019 02:14

Secrecy regarding the price that California utilities finance natural gas contracts is often a new sign that PV has now passed marketplace price parity at general.

The utility-scale solar industry utilized to have to compete next to a “Market Price Referent”. The thought was that, if a solar PPA may be priced at the same or only a typical natural gas PPA, then it turned out considered competitive. Utilities in California are needed by regulators to choose the cheaper option in contracting regarding electricity.

The MPR in those days, in California, was BEING UNFAITHFUL cents a kWh. Beating that price together with 2009-era solar was difficult, but prices dropped and so fast as more photo voltaic was deployed that, when the MPR were still being exercised, it would appear that solar would simply whip gas on price.

Now that solar PPAs are being signed at less than half that old MPR, you realise that it is quite difficult to find any MPR or any gas PPAs to assess prices. MPR figures should used in comparing solar to gas.

n the US, 1st Solar, SunPower, and few key utility-scale players have been building utility-scale solar inside 4 cent range considering that 2015. Even smaller municipal utilities have been able to procure photovoltaic at 4 cents the kilowatt-hour (for example, metropolis utilities of Austin along with Palo Alto).

To always be fair, comparing solar PPAs to gas PPAs is comparing cheerios to oranges.

When a utility signs an electrical Purchase Agreement (PPA) for a renewable source like solar with which has no fuel cost, the utility simply gives a pre-agreed rate per kilowatt-hour for your next 25 years.

The best way that gas contracts are paid is totally different.

Mike Jacobs, who leads regulatory reform with electricity markets as senior energy analyst with the Union of Concerned May, had a good analogy. He likened payment of a natural gas contract to how you rent a car, where you pay one daily rate to obtain the car available to you, but on top of their, you also buy gas running the car every day.

“The same way since cars are rented, throughout fossil fuel contracts, you will find the set daily rate for that machine, and on top of that there is an unknown variable: the price of natural gas over the actual 20 year contract, ” Jacobs shared with CleanTechnica. “Because of the unpredictable aspect of natural gas prices, that fuel cost is usually reimbursed after the simple fact by ratepayers. ”

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