A round-up of policy developments and project news from the US, where Massachusetts’ SMART programme has doubled its capacity and plans to launch a regional imbalance market in the Southeast have come under scrutiny.
Massachusetts has issued an emergency regulation to its Solar Massachusetts Renewable Target (SMART) programme, that includes doubling the PV capacity it seeks to help deploy as well as mandating the addition of energy storage on projects over 500kW.
CIT Group’s Power and Energy unit has arranged approximately US$200 million in financing for a 76MW portfolio of community solar projects located across four US states.
Firm to supply and run 19 MW / 38 MWh portfolio of six energy storage sites coupled with solar, set to contribute to US state's clean energy programme.
Altus Power has acquired a multistate operating portfolio of ground-mounted solar assets located in Massachusetts, North Carolina and New Mexico. The portfolio has a combined generation capacity of 19MW.
A suburb outside of Boston, Massachusetts, has signed off on a new town mandate that requires all new commercial construction projects with an area larger than 10,000 square feet and all new residential buildings with ten or more housing units to feature PV energy.
Ameresco and BlueWave Solar joined Massachusetts state and local officials to commemorate the completion of two community PV projects within the state that have a combined generation capacity of 16.2MW.
In response to Massachusetts Legislature passing a bill raising the state’s renewable energy standard and another encouraging clean energy and energy storage use during peak hours, solar and energy storage trade groups SEIA and ESA offered contrasting views.
PV inverter manufacturer Sungrow and energy storage system integrator / software specialist Greensmith are working on the first community solar-plus-storage project to be delivered in the US state of Massachusetts.
