A policy change would put existing solar projects on landfills and brownfields at risk due to interconnection standstills. An Assembly bill which provides day-for-day extensions for interconnection delays is expected to pass in the Senate.
As part of its bold action to tackle climate change, New Jersey identified brownfields and landfills as ideal locations for solar project development more than a decade ago. These projects, otherwise known as “Subsection (t) projects,” make economic and environmental use of unproductive land while providing quality jobs and an additional tax base for New Jersey communities.
New Jersey was a leader in offering landfills a second chance at a useful life, but inexplicably an impending policy change is leaving a huge swath of solar development behind. The ill-conceived decision effectively leaves landfills out of the new program, called the Successor Solar Incentive Program (SuSI) – a wasted opportunity, if you will, to use landfills and other industrial sites for clean energy.
New Jersey’s existing rules give solar project developers on landfills and contaminated sites 24 months to complete construction and start operation once the state has given them conditional approval.
But reforms at the regional electric grid authority, known as PJM, will likely delay the connection of some of these solar projects to the grid until at least mid-2024. As a result, brownfield solar project sponsors who submitted applications in a timely manner won’t complete those projects in time, and their investment may be lost.
There are nearly 500 megawatts of projects either accepted or pending review under the existing program that remains in limbo. These projects are critical to New Jersey’s clean energy targets and would produce enough electricity to power roughly 100,000 homes.
The substantial benefits of solar located on contaminated sites and landfills led the Board of Public Utilities (BPU) to create a special incentive program for these projects. Now, significant interconnection delays at PJM mean the landfill projects won’t be done on time to meet the program deadline.
The right answer is to give brownfield solar projects in the existing program more time to start operations, in light of the delays at PJM, not to force them into a new program with different rules that don’t enable these more complicated projects to make a reasonable return on their investment.
Thankfully, state leaders understand how important it is to scale clean energy in the face of climate change. This month, the state Assembly unanimously passed legislation that gives Subsection (t) projects a day-for-day extension for any delays brought on by PJM’s interconnection standstill. The bill gives dozens of projects certainty about their incentive value. New Jersey residents would benefit from clean, reliable energy, billions of dollars of investment, and thousands of quality jobs.
A recent report from the Solar Energy Industries Association and Wood Mackenzie found that New Jersey is slipping in the national solar rankings. It ranked 17th nationally for new solar installations in 2021, down from 9th in 2019 and 12th in 2020. This slip comes as solar prices rise due to global supply chain challenges and as the New Jersey solar industry transitions to lower incentive levels in the incentive program.
The overwhelming vote in the state Assembly on S2732 / A4089 underscores how urgent this legislation is for New Jersey’s economy and environment. Once the Senate passes the bill as anticipated, Gov. Phil Murphy must sign it into law.
Scott Elias is the director of state affairs, Mid-Atlantic at the Solar Energy Industries Association.
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