May 8
Eversource Selects First Projects for Community Solar Program
This week's top smart energy news, curated by the Smart Energy Consumer Collaborative (SECC).
Member News
Eversource selected the first round of solar projects through its Community Solar Access Program, which is designed to expand access to solar energy savings for low-income customers in Massachusetts. In this first round, 11 solar projects were selected that are expected to deliver roughly $420 in annual electric bill savings to approximately 1,400 low-income customers statewide.
Salt River Project (SRP) has announced an agreement with NextEra Energy Resources to develop 3,000 MW of new solar generation by the end of 2034, or enough capacity to power 595,000 Arizona homes. The solar development agreement is meant to support SRP’s plan to more than double the capacity of its power system by 2035.
Tennessee Valley Authority and Plus Power have inked a 20-year agreement for a standalone 200 MW/800 MWh battery energy storage facility in Jackson County, Alabama. The Crawfish Creek project is expected to begin construction in 2028 and go live the following year. Crawfish Creek will be one of the first large-scale battery projects in TVA territory and will support the public power provider’s plan to build 6.2 GW of new generation in the coming years.
Duke Energy has delivered more than $5 billion in cost-saving benefits to the customers by implementing operational innovations and efficiencies designed to lower costs. At the center of these cost-saving initiatives is Duke Energy’s proposed combination of the company’s two electric utilities in the Carolinas – Duke Energy Carolinas and Duke Energy Progress.
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Industry News
New electric rates for heat pump owners helped more than 140,000 Massachusetts households save money on their heating bills this winter. Massachusetts consumers with home heat pumps saved some $37 million on their power bills – an average of more than $250 per customer – for the period from November 1 to March 31, compared to what they would have paid without the new seasonal rates.
Octopus Energy and Lunar Energy will offer Texas customers an electricity plan that pairs a high-capacity home battery with fixed energy pricing for three years. Participating customers get a 30 kWh Lunar Energy battery at no upfront cost and a monthly subscription fee of $45, plus electricity at a flat starting rate of 8 cents/kWh. The batteries will provide grid services as well as home backup during outages.
The Facebook group dedicated to opposing a proposed data center project in Northwestern Indiana has over a thousand members and is growing by the week. Since it became clear in mid-January that a data center was planning to come to town, locals in rural Lake County have shared hundreds of posts, ranging from videos about the sounds a data center emits and explainers on the associated water and livestock impacts, to posts seeking “No Data Center” lawn signs.
In the face of soaring energy demand and electric rates, battery developers across the U.S. are stepping in with massive, multi-hundred-megawatt systems that can cheaply dispatch power when it’s needed most. Virginia – the world’s data center capital – is starting to catch on to the big-battery trend. But a new project by local electric providers in the state underscores that much smaller storage projects have value, too.
