UTILITY’S NEIGHBORHOOD SUN

Southern California Edison Throws Switch on Seven New Neighborhood Solar Stations; Utility Sees Transformation of Solar Photovoltaic Power Market
February 1, 2011 (Southern California Edison)

"Seven new solar power plants capable of providing electricity for 8,125 average homes are now online for Southern California Edison (SCE) customers…[The] photovoltaic installations, located in Ontario and Redlands, Calif., have a combined peak generating capacity of 12.5 million watts (AC)…[and] bring to 10 the number of SCE neighborhood solar stations.

"Construction of the solar power plants last year created 250 temporary jobs. SCE estimates its entire solar photovoltaic project – 75 to 100 roof- and ground-mount installations – will create up to 1,200 such jobs…"

An SCE-ProLogis rooftop installation (click to enlarge)

"The Ontario installations involved four solar stations on 1.8 million square feet of leased warehouse roofs owned by ProLogis. The 32,950 solar photovoltaic panels SCE has installed in Ontario are capable of generating 5.5 million watts (AC) of power…In Redlands SCE has built three installations, with 34,600 panels spread over 1.5 million square feet of ProLogis warehouse roofs. The panels can generate 7 million watts (AC) of power…

"At the direction of the state utilities commission, SCE expanded its solar photovoltaic program by offering long-term power purchase agreements to independent producers willing to build neighborhood plants. So far, the utility has awarded 29 contracts, which will yield about 43 million watts (AC) of new solar photovoltaic power for SCE customers."

click to enlarge

"In addition, SCE has seen an increase in the number of cost-effective solar photovoltaic energy bids to provide renewable energy to the utility. The winning bids show a significant reduction in the cost of solar photovoltaic. In November, SCE signed 20 such purchase agreements with the potential to produce 239 million watts (AC) of power.

"SCE’s neighborhood solar stations can be brought online quickly once the distribution circuits they are being connected to are prepared to handle the new generator output and voltage controls…One of SCE’s objectives is to study the impact on local grid reliability, so that these distributed energy resources can be interconnected safely. Lessons learned during deployment of SCE’s solar photovoltaic project will be shared with other utilities and the solar industry to foster similar efforts."