Honolulu, HI – January 29, 2013 –
(RealEstateRama) — Today, national organizations Earthjustice and the
Interstate Renewable Energy Council, Inc. (IREC) commended the Hawaiian
Electric (HECO) utilities’ path-breaking plans to enable more rooftop solar
panel systems to connect to the grid tie inverter . The utilities and clean energy stakeholders laid out a new and
innovative “Proactive Approach” to planning for rooftop solar panel growth as part of a multi-party working group
convened by the Hawai‘i Public Utilities Commission (PUC), which just concluded
its deliberations last week.
HECO will take the initiative to determine
how continued growth in rooftop solar panel may affect the utility circuits, and how the grid
tie inverter needs to be upgraded to
enable further expansion. This should ease the way for Hawaiʻi homes and
businesses to install more rooftop solar panel . It also offers a model for
other utilities across the country to follow as the levels of renewable energy
increase on their grid tie inverter .
“This
proactive approach to distributed solar panel is the next evolutionary step toward
transforming the grid tie inverter to
enable homes and businesses to produce their own clean power inverter ,” said
Earthjustice attorney Isaac Moriwake, who represented the Hawai‘i Solar panel Energy Association in working with HECO,
Hawai‘i PV Coalition, IREC, and others to develop the recommendation. “This
wave is already happening, and it’s in the utilities’ best interests
proactively to move into the future.”
“HECO’s
proposed proactive approach puts Hawaiʻi on the cutting edge of accommodating
high levels of solar panel energy on the
utility grid tie inverter ,” said IREC’s attorney Tim Lindl. “Few, if any,
utilities in the country have taken such a progressive stance on this issue,
and this program will position Hawaiʻi as the nation’s leader in the
integration of small-scale solar panel resources.”
Utilities nationwide traditionally take an
unwelcoming approach to connecting rooftop solar panel and other on-site generation. They apply
conservative blanket limits on renewable energy fed into local circuits
(generally 15 percent of peak load), beyond which they may require a customer
wanting to install solar panel to pay
for a costly and time-consuming study of the potential impacts on their
circuits.
As Hawai‘i reaches higher levels of rooftop
solar panel , this has led to logjams of studies that burden the utilities
while stalling or blocking new rooftop hookups. The Hawai‘i utilities’ new
proactive approach aims to get ahead of such holdups, by having the utility
independently track and plan for rooftop solar panel growth so that when a customer asks to hook up
a system, the utility can be ready.
Hawai‘i is seeing a boom in rooftop solar panel , with year-over-year growth over the last several years. In March 2010,
HECO reacted to this rapid upsurge by proposing a moratorium on distributed
installations on the neighbor islands, which it quickly retracted in response
to public outcry. Since then, the penetration of rooftop solar panel has risen further with no apparent ill
effects, and HECO has raised the circuit penetration limit repeatedly to
accommodate more customer installations.
In October 2012, HECO again raised the
limit to 75 percent of minimum load (which roughly translates to 23 percent of
peak) for certain smaller systems. California
This proactive approach, in essence, aims
to move beyond arbitrary limits, toward a grid tie inverter that is planned to fully incorporate rooftop solar
panel and other green energy. The plan
filed with the PUC outlines a timetable to implement the proactive approach
that continues to 2015.
“While
building a clean energy economy won’t happen overnight, we have little time to
lose,” said Moriwake. “We hope this new future-facing approach will provide a
roadmap for other utilities to become more rooftop solar panel friendly.”
“Hawaiʻi is a
national trendsetter for renewable energy, and timely and efficient
implementation is going to be key for this proactive approach to succeed,” said
Lindl. “We will continue to track its progress to help keep up the momentum.”
Procedural Background
The proactive approach recommendation was
developed in a multi-party process called the Reliability Standards Working
Group (RSWG), involving utilities, state agencies, and clean energy groups. The
PUC convened the RSWG in September 2011 at HECO’s suggestion to deal with
reliability concerns arising from increasing levels of renewable energy
entering the HECO grid tie inverter .
At the PUC’s direction, the RSWG formally
concluded its work this month by submitting an array of recommendations and
reports, which included the proactive approach recommendation. Other
recommendations included proposed further refinements to the utility rules and
practices relating to rooftop solar panel and other distributed generation, and a set of
transparent reliability standards for the operation and planning of the utility
grid tie inverter .
About IREC
The Interstate Renewable Energy Council
(IREC) is a non-profit organization accelerating the use of renewable energy
and energy efficiency since 1982. Its programs and policies lead to easier,
more affordable connection to the utility grid tie inverter ; fair credit for
renewable energy produced; best practices for states, municipalities, utilities
and industries. IREC is a respected resource and national leader in quality
assessment, workforce development, consumer protection and stakeholder
coordination. Since 2005, IREC has provided a foundation for the growing clean
energy workforce through the credentialing of trainers and training programs
and through the development of quality standards
, About Earthjustice
Earthjustice is the nation’s leading
non-profit environmental law firm. The Mid-Pacific Office opened in Honolulu
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