Thirteen solar+storage projects will provide power to critical facilities in New Jersey

Montpelier, VT — Clean Energy Group (CEG) applauds the announcement that the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities will give $3 million to 13 community projects that will use solar+storage at critical facilities to ride out power outages, such as the prolonged and widespread outages that resulted from Hurricane Sandy in 2012. The awards, part of the state's Renewable Electric Storage Incentive, leverage the income the projects will generate from selling services into the PJM frequency regulation market, one of a number of emerging electric services markets that are providing support for distributed generation and storage.

"New Jersey is one of the States leading the way to support solar plus storage for critical public facilities," said Lewis Milford, president of Clean Energy Group. "It has been doubly clever to fund projects that will get the bulk of their revenue from these new FERC rules, saving the taxpayers money and stabilizing the grid. These projects will protect people and save them money, a great result for a good program motivated by Superstorm Sandy."

The emergence of electric services markets is a game-changer for technologies such as solar with energy storage, which can make money by selling electric services while simultaneously helping to integrate renewables, reducing facility electricity costs, and providing a resilient power benefit when needed.

The awards conclude the first round of the New Jersey program, which is the first state program to specifically solicit storage paired with renewables to support critical facilities. The program had $3 million to expend in round 1, but program staff anticipate increasing that in round 2, planned for 2016.

Seven of the projects will be located at schools, which will serve as public shelters, with the remainder supporting municipal buildings and wastewater treatment plants.

The program was oversubscribed, with 22 applications requesting more than $4.6 million. Incentives were capped at $500,000 or 30% of the installed cost. Total project investment is projected at $11.8 million. Total storage capacity will be 8.75 MW.

Clean Energy Group will provide more details on these projects as additional information is made public.

Clean Energy Group will continue to support New Jersey in its resilient power efforts. For more information on CEG's work in this area, please visit www.resilient-power.com.

Clean Energy Group will be hosting a free webinar on the topic of solar+storage at schools on Tuesday, March 31 at 2pm ET. Guest speakers from Florida and New Jersey will present. For more information and to register, please visit https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/8709262754443964418.