Blog | beEdison

Software Innovation Strengthens Clean Tech Financing, for Everyone

May 14, 2015 in Solar by beEdison

This article originally appeared on the official blog for the American Council On Renewable Energy. This is the final installment of a 3 part series We have a bright future ahead of us if we harness the full potential of our country’s renewable energy resources. Transforming the way we produce and distribute energy will not only be good for our environment, it will also be great for our economy—spurring innovation and creating jobs. So how do we make the most of the opportunity that lies before us? In part 1 of this blog series, the challenges currently being faced by…

Simplifying Solar Diligence: A TurboTax®-like Solution

May 7, 2015 in Solar by beEdison

This article originally appeared on the official blog for the American Council On Renewable Energy. This is part 2 of a 3 part series It’s time to relax. The day has passed and we can all finally let out a collective sigh of relief now that we’ve successfully navigated the obstacle course that is filing our annual income tax return. Luckily, almost no one needed to read the 3,863 page long Internal Revenue Code to figure out how to complete their taxes. Most of us were probably smart enough to use TurboTax®, or another tax return preparation tool like it. If you…

Increasing Returns for Solar Tax Equity

May 5, 2015 in Solar by beEdison

Oversupply of Deals to Drive-up Yields through 2016YE This is part 1 of a 2 part series In the US today, solar photovoltaic projects receive an Investment Tax Credit (ITC) of 30% of eligible costs. Project equity sponsors often look for an investor (called the Tax Equity Investor) to co-invest in their projects and monetize the ITC. Capital from Tax Equity Investors (called Tax Equity Investment) constitutes approximately 35% of the total capital required for each project. The remainder is provided by the project sponsor and term debt, if applicable. For smaller projects, Tax Equity Investments can earn a 30%…

A Rosetta Stone for Commercial & Industrial Solar

May 1, 2015 in Solar by beEdison

This article originally appeared on the official blog for the American Council On Renewable Energy. This is part 1 of a 3 part series. The U.S. solar industry continues to face real obstacles to scale despite all the positive news about growth in jobs and installations this past year. There are widening imbalances, and looming disruptions, among the residential, commercial and utility solar segments that reveal some of the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead. Industry leaders are working together, however, to crack the code on solar diligence and streamline the process for financing commercial and industrial solar projects. According…

beEdison is a Finalist in the 2015 “Finance for Resilience” competition!

March 19, 2015 in Solar by beEdison

Finance for Resilience (FiRe) is an open and action-oriented competition platform that collects, develops and helps implement powerful ideas to accelerate finance for clean energy, climate, sustainability and green growth. FiRe, which is run by Bloomberg New Energy Finance, focuses on interventions that are led primarily by the private sector, bear the potential of significant incremental finance and can be implemented independently from the international policy process of climate change. This year beEdison, with the support of truSolar’s working group members, submitted an intervention titled: “Automating a Fico-like risk score for clean energy.” The submission was judged by a panel…

Will standardized credit assessments for unrated off-takers unleash the potential of solar in the non-residential space?

February 13, 2015 in Credit Analysis, Solar by beEdison

According to Bloomberg New Energy Finance, the United States deployed 1.2GW of commercial solar in 2014. (1) This may sound like good news, but the graph to the right clearly shows that in 2014, America’s residential sector overtook the commercial sector for the first time in terms of annual PV capacity deployments. This development begs the question: what is preventing America’s non-residential solar sector from scaling at a faster rate, noting the country consumes more than twice as much electricity in the commercial and industrial segments today as it does in residential? In many respects, it is easier to deploy solar…

This Is How Solar Becomes the Incumbent Energy Source in the US

February 3, 2015 in Solar by beEdison

Amidst all the dour news for so many years about economic growth, debt and deficits, climate woes and so much more, it would be pretty good news if some incredible contender could add tens of thousands of jobs, contribute tens of billions of dollars in growth, create real, generational wealth and foster a greener environment for communities across our nation. Fortunately, this job-generating, carbon-reducing contender is real: All eyes should be on solar. That’s the good news. The bad news is that solar energy still faces extraordinary external obstacles from conventional, centralized, incumbent power generation and the companies and interests…