By Eric Wesoff | Greentech Media
The Utah solar experiment is officially underway as the state races from near-zero solar to potentially bringing hundreds of megawatts of solar on-line.
The Beehive State has great solar and land resources. However, the state does not yet have a renewable portfolio standard (RPS) and burns cheap coal for the majority of its power. Utah’s average residential electricity price was 10.4 cents per kilowatt-hour in March of this year, according to EIA.
Despite low electricity costs, regional utility Rocky Mountain Power (RMP) is signing several twenty-year solar power-purchase agreements with renewables developer First Wind. The largest proposed project in this recent wave of solar PPAs is First Wind’s 320-megawatt “Four Brothers” solar plant in Utah’s Beaver and Iron Counties, consisting of four separate 80-megawatt solar power sites.
If you’d like to discuss energy issues, contact Court Rich, director of Rose Law Group’s Renewable Energy Department at crich@roselawgroup.com
