Advanced Energy Perspectives

Fisker Automotive gave signs of ill health this week as its COO indicated that the electric vehicle company may file for bankruptcy. The New York Times concluded that the company has “broken down on the road to electric cars,” as the company skipped a large loan payment due last week, which led the federal government to begin seizing Fisker’s assets.

The road to electric vehicles itself continues despite the setback, though. This week, research and consulting firm Navigant released a new report predicting sales of electric vehicles will grow to 22 million by 2020. With wider availability, greater charging infrastructure, and falling prices, sales of EVs have already begun to break records. News this week from EV manufacturers show growth across the board: Tesla announced strong first quarter performance, and sales of both the Chevy Volt and Nissan Leaf are up compared to this time last year. All told, the three companies sold more than 12,500 electric cars in the first quarter of 2013.

When individuals and businesses are thinking about adding solar PV to their roof, the first concern is usually the cost.  While most every form of electric generation is financed and amortized over time, solar is generally seen as an up-front investment - and many times this presents an insurmountable barrier for the consumer.

This week AEE partner organization North Carolina Sustainable Energy Association helped to defeat a threat to the state’s renewable energy mandate. North Carolina was in the sites of an effort to roll back renewable energy portfolio standards across the board—more than a dozen states faced similar threats to their renewable energy requirements. Greentech Media published a story earlier this year about the “war” on state renewables standards. But so far, that war seems one-sided: not a single state has compromised its commitment to renewable energy.

With Arkansas Governor Mike Beebe’s signature on Monday, April 15, 2013, Senate Bill 640, the Property Assessed Clean Energy Act, became law to enable local option clean energy financing in the Natural State for the first time. The new law authorizes government entities to voluntarily form energy improvement districts with the power to issue tax-exempt bonds to fund low-interest, long-term loans to interested property owners for energy efficiency improvements, water conservation improvements and renewable energy projects.  

Property Assessed Clean Energy tax financing mechanisms, which pay off energy upgrades through a surcharge on real estate taxes, came of age several years ago.  Known as PACE, they got their start with “the Berkeley model” for residential home financing of energy improvements and have now spread across the country. With the infamous Federal Housing and Finance Authority (FHFA) “letter” of a few years ago, most of these programs came to a grinding halt.  But to paraphrase Mark Twain – reports of their death have been greatly exaggerated.