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Florida legislators want to kill solar net metering, and hundreds rallied in protest

State legislators in Florida have approved Florida SB 1024 and HB 741, which would require future rooftop solar panel owners to pay higher rates and curb net metering. Yesterday, solar workers traveled to Tallahassee and let legislators know what a terrible idea they think these bills are.

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A Florida utility ditches coal, doubles its solar, and leaves out a big part of its story

Florida utility Tampa Electric Co. has announced it will retire three coal units and double its solar output within two years. That’s good news, but in an interview published last week, its CEO doesn’t mention the fact that the vast majority of its power comes from natural gas or whether it plans to transition away from the methane-producing fossil fuel.

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Florida’s governor just locked ‘Florida into a dirty fossil fuel future’

Governor Ron DeSantis (R-FL) just signed into law SB 1128/HB 919, “Preemption Over Restriction of Utility Services,” which was pushed through the legislature. It prevents local governments from deciding which energy path they want to take. In other words, Florida towns and cities are now unable to switch to 100% clean energy because they can’t ban fossil fuels.

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Duke Energy Florida announces two more new solar farms

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Duke Energy Florida has announced that it will build two more new solar farms in the Sunshine State. This time, they’ll be in Citrus and Hardee counties.

The utility reported in February that it is investing an estimated $1 billion to construct or acquire a total of 700 MW of solar farms from 2018 through 2022 in Florida and will more than quadruple the amount of in-service solar on the system over the next four years.

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Florida proposes $10 million to solar+storage for ‘critical disaster resilience facilities’

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Florida Representative Holly Raschein has sponsored a new bill in the Florida Legislature to fund a $10 million pilot program installing solar panels and energy storage at strategic public facilities to keep them up and running during critical events and natural disasters.

The program would start on July 1, and run for a single year. The Florida Solar Energy Center (FSEC) will administer and report on the outcomes, with potential expansion.


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Tesla giving up residential solar leasing to be in the Florida ‘sunshine’ market – and it might be the company’s future

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State of Florida law states only an approved and regulated electric utility is allowed to sell electricity to the public. The 1988 court case, PW Ventures, Inc. v. Nichols, clarified this position. With Tesla’s SolarCity announcing that they’ll service customers of Duke Energy and the Orlando Utilities Commission in the greater Orlando area, they’ll have to abandon their ‘solar lease’ model in Florida – a state with no solar incentives.

In this model, Tesla owns the solar power system and takes all incentives, then sells the homeowner discounted electricity in a 20-year contract. With a population greater than 20 million people, the third largest state is a ripe opportunity – and maybe a laboratory.


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Tesla’s SolarCity announces expansion in Florida after long battle against local utilities

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Despite its “Sunshine State” nickname, Florida ranks among the lowest states for solar power deployment thanks to anti-solar regulations backed by local electric utilities. But on election day, the citizens of Florida showed interest in solar energy by rejecting the anti-solar Amendment 1, which according to solar installers, including SolarCity, would have made it easier for utilities to add fees to make solar more expensive for customers.

Following the election, Tesla’s SolarCity is the latest solar installer announcing an expansion in Florida today now that it will become economically viable for a lot more households to install solar arrays on their homes.
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Florida gets supercharged with 2 new Tesla supercharger stations in Ft. Myers and Port St. Lucie

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The next step in lighting up the east cost is complete with the east and west side of Florida getting getting superchargers. The new addresses:

Oh, and Norway just got put on the map.