From the EIA -- see if you can spot the glaring omission in this EIA "tweet":
Based on EIA survey data for new, utility-scale electric generators (those with a capacity greater than one megawatt), capacity-weighted average construction costs for many generator types have fallen in recent years.
Annual changes in construction costs include the effects of differences in the geographic distribution of installed capacity between years, differences in technology types, and other changes in capital and financing costs…
The capacity-weighted cost of installing wind turbines was $1,661 per kilowatt (kW) in 2015, a 12% decrease from 2013…The cost of utility-scale solar photovoltaic generators declined 21% between 2013 and 2015, from $3,705/kW to $2,921/kW…The average cost of natural gas generators installed in 2015 was $696/kW, a 28% decline from 2013…Construction costs alone do not determine the economic attractiveness of a generation technology.
Other factors such as fuel costs (for generators that consume fuel), utilization rates, financial incentives, and state policies also affect project economics and, in turn, the kinds of power plants that are built. --- EIA
The Red Lake Band of Chippewa Indians has signed a formal agreement
with the Winkelman Building Corp. and Innovative Power Systems Inc. to
design, engineer, procure, construct and manage solar energy projects
for the three Red Lake casinos and various other tribal government
buildings.
Red Lake will install 15 megawatts—equal to 15 million watts—worth of
solar panels across the rooftops of the band’s largest buildings. When
they’re done, the panels will generate enough power to light every bulb
in the tribe’s three casinos, the tribal college and all government
buildings. The ultimate goal is to generate enough solar power on tribal
land to supply every home on Red Lake within five years.
The Red Lake solar power plan is divided into three phases. Phase I will
cover three casinos, the Red Lake Government Center, Red Lake Nation
College, the Justice Center Complex, the Humanities Facility and other
large buildings. It involves installing $20 million to $30 million in
solar energy equipment and providing solar energy training for the Red
Lake workforce.
But there's more:
Phase II will be the development of solar energy farms on ceded
lands up north and will consist of 40 to 100 acres of solar panels that
will provide 10 to 20 megawatts of electricity to be sold to the grid,
thus producing a steady revenue stream for years to come for the tribe.
The solar array will help Minnesota Power comply with the state’s new
solar mandate. It represents a part of the solar power that Minnesota
Power needs to add by 2020 under a new law requiring investor-owned
electric utilities to get 1.5 percent of their energy from the sun.
Coops like Beltrami Electric are not subject to the same mandate.
Phase III will be the development of a solar energy plant that will
produce solar equipment for the industry, while providing jobs
assembling solar panels for the members of Red Lake Nation.
Eighty percent of phase one will be completed by the end of 2016.
Funding:
Winkelman estimates the cost at upwards of $20 million.
The band itself
will only pay only $100,000 for the project, with the vast majority of
costs shouldered by the Olson Energy Corporation, which specializes in
shuttling solar developers through the government incentive system.
Olson Energy has developed a financial plan to assist in addressing the
financial needs for solar energy development. U.S. tax law provides a
variety of benefits to developers and owners of renewable energy
projects, since non-taxed entities such as units of government cannot
benefit directly from these incentives.
After decades of advocacy and a gazillion dollars in tax giveaways to the solar companies. Kenosha News is reporting:
The future of solar energy in Wisconsin appears bright but could use a little more wattage.
In 2014, Wisconsin installed 2 megawatts of solar electric capacity, an investment price tag of $7 million.
As of the middle of this year, there were more than 171 solar companies at work in Wisconsin, employing 1,900 people.
Despite these pretty big numbers, when it comes to
installing and utilizing solar power in Wisconsin, compared to other
states, we fall somewhere in the middle of the pack.
According to statistics provided by the Solar Energies
Industries Association in a report with GTM Research, the solar capacity
installed in 2014 ranks our state 34th nationally and the total
cumulative installed solar capacity — 21 megawatts, enough to power
3,100 homes — puts us 30th nationwide.
As Chris Christie would say, "We have - wait a second - we have 19 trillion dollars in debt, we have
people out of work, we have ISIS and al Qaeda attacking us, and we're
talking about 2 MW of electricity installed in one year in one of our biggest, sunniest states! Can we stop?"
Christie just wants to break free!
Queen, I Want To Break Free
$7 million / 2 MW = $3.5 million / MW. But at least it's free, intermittent, and great for a sun tan.
In the current Wisconsin Public Service case, the utility is asking
regulators to increase the monthly residential fixed charge to $25 after
implementing an 82 percent increase less than a year ago, from $10.40
to $19. The utility would reduce the variable kilowatt-hour charge.
The new rate design is justified, the utility says, because
long-standing tariffs rely too heavily on variable energy charges to
recover fixed costs like meters, poles, wires and substations.
A continued emphasis of energy efficiency from state and federal
policies, slow customer growth in its service area and increased
penetration of rooftop solar are causing energy sales to flatline and
eroding its ability to recover those fixed costs, Wisconsin Public
Service says. And solar penetration will only continue to accelerate as
costs decline.
I've said this before: Americans pay so little for electricity that they are willing to let their monthly utility bills double (perhaps even more) simply to feel good (installing 2 MW of solar power in one year, for example). When folks are willing to pay $4.50 for a fancy coffee at Starbucks, an extra dollar a day for electricity is hardly worth getting excited about. Same with gasoline. It's so cheap, people no longer feel any urgency to put in the infrastructure to move crude oil and thus we have the keystoning of the Sandpiper in Minnesota.
