Minnesota legislators propose nation’s first solar-themed license plate
In 2016, a coalition of energy, agriculture, and conservation organizations worked together to pass Minnesota’s Pollinator-Friendly Solar Act, the nation’s first ground cover standard for solar facilities. Using seed mixtures which cost less than 0.1% of the overall project budget, the flexible and science-based standard established minimum requirements for solar site owners to implement in order to claim that solar projects “provide habitat beneficial to pollinators, songbirds or game birds.”
The resulting program, managed by Minnesota’s Board of Water and Soil Resources, has been successful, but is operating in limited capacity without dedicated funding. Minnesota recently passed ambitious renewable energy and carbon-free electricity requirements, which will result in significantly more solar projects throughout the state.
Legislative leaders and a broad coalition of leading organizations have now proposed a voluntary and dedicated funding mechanism — the nation’s first license plate featuring a solar facility.
The license plate artwork, executed by REPLACE design studio, was commissioned by Natural Resources Services with contributions from Connexus Energy and employees of US Solar and Bare Honey. Representative Matt Norris and Senator Rob Kupec are chief authors of the bill (HF 5207/SF 5239) that would create the new license plate.
EPA invests $20 billion in national green bank project
On April 4, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced its selections for $20 billion in grant awards under two competitions within the historic $27 billion Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund (GGRF), which was created under the Inflation Reduction Act as part of President Biden’s Investing in America agenda. The three selections under the $14 billion National Clean Investment Fund and five selections under the $6 billion Clean Communities Investment Accelerator will create a national clean financing network for clean energy and climate solutions across sectors, ensuring communities have access to the capital they need to participate in and benefit from a cleaner, more sustainable economy. By financing tens of thousands of projects, this national clean financing network will mobilize private capital to reduce climate and air pollution while also reducing energy costs, improving public health and creating good-paying clean energy jobs in communities across the country, especially in low-income and disadvantaged communities.
Vice President Kamala Harris and EPA Administrator Michael S. Regan will announce the selections under these two grant competitions in Charlotte, North Carolina. While in Charlotte, the Vice President and Administrator will meet with a homeowner in a historically Black community, where a local nonprofit, Self-Help, worked with community partners to finance, renovate, and construct energy-efficient, affordable homes for low- and moderate-income families. Thanks to that partnership, this first-time homeowner pays significantly lower energy bills and has a healthy and comfortable place to raise his family. The selections the Vice President is announcing will ensure more families can experience those same benefits. In fact, one of the selections being announced today will allow Self-Help and its partners as part of the Climate United Fund’s application to deliver similar home efficiency projects to over 30,000 homes across the country.
Collectively, the selected applicants have committed to driving significant impact toward the program’s objectives. They will reduce or avoid up to 40 million metric tons of climate pollution per year, making a significant contribution to the Biden-Harris Administration’s climate goals. They will mobilize almost $7 of private capital for every $1 of federal funds, ensuring that each public dollar is leveraged for significant private-sector investment. And they will dedicate over $14 billion of capital — over 70% of the selections for awards announced today — toward low-income and disadvantaged communities, making the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund the single largest non-tax investment within the Inflation Reduction Act to build a clean energy economy while benefiting communities historically left behind.
SolarEdge acquires EV charging software startup.
SolarEdge Technologies announced that it completed the acquisition of the entire share capital of Wevo Energy. Wevo is a software startup specializing in EV charging optimization and management for sites with large quantities of EV chargers such as apartment buildings, workplace carparks and public charging locations.
Wevo’s software is designed to be vendor-agnostic and supports industry-leading open protocols, enabling multi-user pricing and billing, tiered prioritization of charging schedules, predictive load management and a range of additional services. To date, Wevo has electrified many thousands of parking spaces across North America, Europe and the Middle East. Wevo is already integrated with SolarEdge’s EV chargers, solar inverters and meters, for a holistic real-time view of solar production, grid consumption and EV charging.
The Wevo solution will also be part of the SolarEdge ONE energy optimization system for the C&I segment, designed to offer SolarEdge customers a single energy optimization solution that orchestrates and integrates between on-site solar generation, battery storage and large-scale EV charging.
“This acquisition represents the continuation of SolarEdge’s strategy to enhance its software portfolio for the C&I segment. We are excited for Wevo to join the SolarEdge team following our initial investment and the impressive progress it has demonstrated over the past year. As the EV market continues to grow, distributed renewable energy will be key to unlocking the full potential of the electrification of mobility. Wevo’s software capabilities and know-how represent a building block for EV-attached solar, and today it becomes a part of SolarEdge’s energy ecosystem,” said Zvi Lando, CEO of SolarEdge Technologies.
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