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Energy Top 10 solar states


The Solar Energy Industries Association ranked the states based on the cumulative amount of solar electric capacity installed through the first quarter of this year.


Rank State 1 California


2 North Carolina 3 Arizona 4 Nevada


5 New Jersey


6 Massachusetts 7 Texas 8 Florida 9 Utah


10 Georgia


energy-hungry data centers. Ashburn’s “Data Center Alley,” for


example, now has the largest concentra- tion of data centers in the world, with more than 70 percent of the world’s internet traffic passing through Loudoun County’s digital infrastructure. In late 2017, Google announced it


would build two more data centers in Loudoun, after purchasing 148 acres of land for $70 million. Also driving solar energy growth is


a steep drop in price. According to one industry source, the cost to develop a kilo- watt of solar power has fallen from $96 in 1970 to 40 cents this year. So, it’s no wonder that Virginia enti-


ties — from the governor’s office to the state’s largest utilities to private companies — are scrambling to corral solar, on a commercial and residential scale.


A tipping point Kenneth Jurman, renewable energy


program manager at the Virginia Department of Mines, Minerals and Energy (DMME), notes a tipping point that helped ignite the current wave of solar development. For a number of years, he says, the largest solar facility in Virginia was a


90 AUGUST 2018


Megawatts 22,071


4,412 3,463 2,607 2,447 2,138 1,973 1,893 1,616 1,553


No. of homes 5,791,398


504,120 514,079 425,079 381,919 354,256 225,727 221,521 311,828 173,639


Source: Solar Energy Industries Association


2.1-megawatt array at Naval Station Norfolk built in 2012. Then, in 2015, Amazon Web


Services sent a shock wave through Virginia’s Eastern Shore with a proposal to build an 80-megawatt, 1,000-acre solar farm in Accomack County. Amazon Web Services has its Eastern corporate campus in Fairfax County. Its parent company, Amazon.com, also has data centers and warehouses in Virginia. The Accomack project was subse-


quently acquired by Dominion Energy from the original developer, Community Energy Inc. “The prices on solar have come


down so much, it was only a matter of time before they became competitive,” Jurman says. A spokesman for the Virginia


Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) says there are 59 notices of intent awaiting action that represent about 2,646 megawatts of solar. Going forward, John Warren,


DMME’s director, expects the state to focus on programs that penetrate more under-served markets. “There is little customer choice, and there is significant growth opportunity in the small- customer market areas. I would expect


to see support for this reflected in future state budget processes,” Warren told Virginia Business in an email. In the meantime, large projects are


grabbing headlines. Salt Lake City-based sPower is the developer behind a pro- posed 500-megawatt solar installation in rural Spotsylvania County. Most of the power, 315 megawatts,


would be purchased by Microsoft, the Redmond, Wash.-based software giant. Microsoft says it would be the largest corporate purchase of solar power in the U.S. If the project receives the necessary approvals for construction, it will put Virginia on the solar map.


Community solar Ivy Main, renewable energy chair


for the Virginia Chapter of the Sierra Club, says, “Virginia leaders have woken up to the new reality of solar as not just a clean, renewable resource, but also a low-cost one that offers a big opportunity for jobs and economic develop- ment — and a great way to attract tech companies to the state. “Unfortunately,”


Main Main adds, the [General


Assembly] hasn’t addressed the other half of the solar pie — solar in Virginia communities. “Rooftops, parking lots, airports,


closed landfills, and other spaces could be doing double duty generating electric- ity and saving money for customers and local governments, but for the numerous barriers to customer-owned solar that the utilities managed to enshrine in Virginia law as a way to protect their monopoly.” Main cites these examples:


• Owners of multifamily housing can’t put solar arrays on their roofs and sell the output to tenants.


• A customer can’t put solar arrays on one building on a property and use it on another if it is separately metered. This year’s General Assembly passed


an extensive overhaul of the state’s utility regulations, which took effect on July 1. The Grid Transformation and Security Act calls for 5,000 new megawatts of solar and wind energy, including 500 MW


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