New Agreement Seeks to Keep Clean Energy Projects on Track

Jessyca Sheehan is a senior associate in APCO’s Sacramento office and a member of APCO’s energy & clean tech practice.

Newsrooms are abuzz this week with rumors that more Solyndra-type debacles could be on the horizon. In recent months, we have already seen additional clean energy projects stalled due to the financial insolvency of the developers. Against this backdrop, it was encouraging to see state and federal officials renewing a landmark commitment to keep clean energy projects on track in California.

Last week, California Governor Jerry Brown and U.S. Department of the Interior Secretary Ken Salazar came together at a solar power project near Sacramento to sign a new agreement to continue to bring more renewable projects on line. The agreement is an extension of one originally signed in 2009, which has reportedly helped fast track the approval process for more than a dozen utility-scale solar energy projects and more than 130 other green energy projects in California.

What is particularly noteworthy about the new agreement, however, is that it expands the original terms to include streamlining the permitting process for new transmission lines that would connect to new energy sources. More often than not, the energy generated from the sun, wind or geothermal sources is located in remote places such as the desert or the mountains and new transmission is needed to deliver the clean energy to California’s more than 36 million residents. Getting new transmission approved, however, is a messy process that runs up against property-owner NIMBYism, jurisdictional and legal issues and challenges, lengthy regulatory hurdles and concerns about the impact on the environment and habitat, among others.

California has proven time and again to be a leader in the renewables and clean tech space and it’s heartening to see that despite some hiccups, state officials are moving forward with policies that support clean energy development. Perhaps the governor said it best: “There will be screw-ups, there are going to be bankruptcies, there are going to be indictments,” Brown said. “But we are going to keep going.”

So what do you think – will this new agreement work to speed up transmission permitting, or will the same challenges continue to get in the way? Will other states follow suit and replicate this type of agreement, or are there too many cold feet in this post-Solyndra world? We’ll be watching to see…