Electricity
Why We Still Need To Discuss Grid Defection
The rapidly declining costs of distributed energy resources (DERs), including rooftop solar photovoltaics (PV) and behind-the-meter batteries, have introduced new dynamics into a traditionally slow-moving electricity industry. This paradigm shift has ushered us into a new era where previous assumptions about how, where, and at what scale electricity is best…
Solar Embrace
More than a year ago, Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI) announced its Shine Program would focus on community-scale solar. We claimed that community-scale solar could be procured at costs close to utility-scale solar, unlocking a 5–30 GW market by 2020. However, we could not have predicted the success of our initial…
The Energy Web Foundation: Bringing Blockchain Technology to the Grid
Blockchain technology—the technology underpinning the Bitcoin virtual currency—is being discussed as one of the most potentially disruptive technologies since the Internet. Blockchains are a combination of information technology, cryptography, and governance principles that enables transactions to occur without the need for a third party to establish…
Five Reasons Your Company Should Buy Off-site Renewables in 2017
Guest author Scott Macmurdo is a sustainability specialist with NRG Energy, which is a founding sponsor of the Business Renewables Center. Guest author Patrick Molloy is a financial analyst at the Business Renewables Center. Corporate interest in renewable energy is skyrocketing as companies realize that off-site projects can offer the flexibility…
Report Release: Financing Community-Scale Solar
Download Financing Community-Scale Solar here. Effective financing approaches have been fundamental to the solar industry’s exponential growth over the past 15 years. The first solar power purchase agreement (PPA) in the early 2000s enabled customers to spread their upfront costs for solar over time, just as…
