Developer says new community solar project in Aurora beneficiary of updated state law

A solar project in Aurora that will power office buildings, homes and retail is a prime example of how updates to a state law on community solar gardens is helping expand opportunities for renewable energy, the developer said.

Unico Solar Investors, Excelsior Clean Capital and Namasté Solar are partnering to build four new community solar gardens with a total capacity of 8 megawatts. Unico Solar, the owner/operator, said the 75% of the project aimed at commercial users is locked in and residential customers are being lined up.

Adam Knoff, director and co-founder of Unico Solar, said office buildings will make up most of the commercial users. The square footage of the commercial buildings totals 781,859.

“The group of commercial and industrial (buildings) that has not traditionally had access to solar has been commercial office buildings,” Knoff said. “They’re obviously a huge source of both electricity consumption and therefore greenhouse-gas emissions.”

Part of the challenge is that office buildings are often tall and skinny, making it tough to install enough solar arrays to efficiently generate the electricity needed, Knoff said

Community solar gardens are centralized arrays of solar panels that connect to electric utilities’ systems. Users subscribe and then get credits on their monthly utility bills. The projects are alternatives when a building’s roof isn’t big enough for solar panels or isn’t in a good spot. They’re also an option for people in apartments or condos.

About 75% of Denver-area households can’t put solar panels on their roof, according to state Sen. Chris Hansen, who sponsored a 2019 law to expand access to community solar gardens.

“Historically, there hasn’t been a significant amount of residential capacity available through Xcel Energy’s community solar garden program,” Knoff said

Unico Solar and its partners committed to making 25% of the subscription base residential “to help expand the benefits of solar and renewable energy access” to more people, Knoff said.

Colorado was a leader in community solar gardens, adopting the country’s first statewide program in 2010. However, solar advocates and industry representatives say the state has lagged behind other states since then because of limits on the size of projects and other restrictions.

The changes made to expand access to community solar gardens included increasing to 5 megawatts from 2 megawatts the maximum size of a project. The cap will increase to 10 megawatts after July 1, 2023.

Another change is the elimination of a requirement that subscribers live in or next to the county where the project is located. That requirement limited the number of solar gardens because many of the potential customers are in the Denver area where land is less available.

Knoff said the 2019 law helped make Unico Solar’s project possible because the company can locate the four projects next to each other. “The more solar you can build in one place, you get economies of scale, which translates indirectly into lower subscription rates and benefits ratepayers.”

While the updates addressed some of the constraints, advocates say the Public Utilities Commission’s rules implementing the law are a mixed bag for the industry and that demand is still outstripping the capacity available.

In 2020, 75 megawatts were offered for community solar gardens through Xcel Energy, but bids from solar companies totaled about 400 megawatts, said Mike Kruger, president and CEO of the Colorado Solar and Storage Association.

A filing in 2020 by Xcel Energy, the state’s largest electric utility, said there were 93.2 megawatts of solar gardens operating at the end of 2019 and 320.7 megawatts that were operational or had been awarded through its system.

Black Hills Energy said it will have 10 community solar gardens for a total capacity of 10.5 megawatts, 2.5 megawatts of which will be for low-income costumers, by the end of this year

One megawatt of solar energy can supply electricity to 200 to 250 homes.

Unico Solar started as a sustainability department of Unico Investment Group. It teamed up last year with Excelsior Energy Capital to form the joint venture UX Solar. Namasté Solar is a co-developer and designed and is building the arrays.

The project will start producing in phases, with the first 2-megawatt section to start in May.

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