‘Vast majority’ of 8minute US solar pipeline will be solar-plus-storage

Earlier this month 8minute closed a letter of credit facility with five major banks to be used to post securities for power purchase agreements and fund interconnection agreements for a growing portfolio that boasts more than 50 sites throughout California, Texas and other states in the US southwest.

The financing came around a month after the company added 3GW of new projects to its existing pipeline, taking 8minute’s portfolio of projects at various stages of development to 18GW.

And now Kiernan has said the “vast majority” of this pipeline is to come forward on a co-located basis.

“Our team continues to design projects that seamlessly and efficiently generate, store and dispatch power when it’s needed the most. The industry should continue prioritising energy storage to better serve communities’ energy needs – day and night – and position solar as one of the dominant solutions to the climate crisis,” he told Energy-Storage.news.

8minute has previously disclosed that future developments would look to replicate the model adopted by its landmark Eland Solar & Storage Center project, located in Kern County, California. That project – currently under construction – will combine 400MWac of solar with 300MW/1,200MWh of energy storage and provide power at a dispatchable price of US$0.04c/kWh, 8minute has claimed.

PV Tech’s downstream print publication PV Tech Power explored the potential for co-located and hybrid renewables projects in volume 22, published earlier this year. The full cover feature of that volume, ‘Joined at the hip: A hybrid future for onshore renewables’, can be read here.  

Additional reporting by Andy Colthorpe.