50% Off Solar Training for Massachusetts Based Employees and Companies, up to $3,000 per Employee and $30,000 per Company This article is quick, but awesome! If you’re a Massachusetts company and looking to train employees on solar, you can apply for a workforce training grants and get 50% off, 3 HeatSpring trainings. This is for companies that need to… Continue reading “50% Off Solar Training for Massachusetts Based Employees and Companies, up to $3,000 per Employee and $30,000 per Company”
How We Financed a 13kW Solar Project on a Church in Massachusetts The following is a guest post by Fred Paris, the instructor of our Solar PV Installer Boot Camp Training + NABCEP Entry Level Exam Prep. Fred tells the story of how he worked with members of a church to finance… Continue reading “How We Financed a 13kW Solar Project on a Church in Massachusetts”
“If Banks Only Understood Solar, My Commercial Solar Business Would Grow” We’ve had over 800 people download our commercial solar PV finance model. If you haven’t, you can download the Commercial Solar Model here. When our readers, students and alumni download it, we ask them what the is the #1 obstalce… Continue reading ““If Banks Only Understood Solar, My Commercial Solar Business Would Grow””
Why Get NABCEP Certified? Is getting NABCEP Certified worth it? It’s the only game in town in the solar industry, but it’s not really required – it’s not a license. People ask me whether it’s worth it all the time and I don’t really… Continue reading “Why Get NABCEP Certified?”
Solar PV Web Marketing Practices Needed to Beat SolarCity + the Big Guys It’s clear that the bottlenecks to the solar PV industry are become less and less technical (though technical challenges still exist), and more about more about finance, sales and marketings. What does this mean? The companies that are the best… Continue reading “Solar PV Web Marketing Practices Needed to Beat SolarCity + the Big Guys”
Vermont Has the Most Progressive Solar Permitting Process in the Nation Until recently, Rachel Tronstein served as the Deputy Director of the SunShot Initiative at the U.S. Department of Energy. SunShot is a presidential level initiative focused on making R&D investments that will drive down the installed cost of solar so… Continue reading “Vermont Has the Most Progressive Solar Permitting Process in the Nation”
The Impact of SREC Value Assumptions on Commercial Solar PV Project IRRs Calculating the the un-levered (no debt), internal rate of return (IRR) of a commercial solar PV project is key to selling the project to the property owner, or gain investors on board for financing. If you’re still using the term… Continue reading “The Impact of SREC Value Assumptions on Commercial Solar PV Project IRRs”
HeatSpring is Building the Largest Library of Free Clean Energy Product Training to Get Manufactures in Front of Contractors All Manufactures know that they need product training Everyone needs to get up to speed on how to use specific products. Every product is a little bit different and getting distributors and contractors to really understand a product makes them… Continue reading “HeatSpring is Building the Largest Library of Free Clean Energy Product Training to Get Manufactures in Front of Contractors”
How Small Solar Companies Can “Out-market” Large Solar Installers with Deep Pockets with @SolarFred We need to make sure that small solar companies can compete, be profitable, and grow in the solar industry. This means effectively marketing and selling against large solar installers that have huge budgets. If you’re currently creating a solar sales… Continue reading “How Small Solar Companies Can “Out-market” Large Solar Installers with Deep Pockets with @SolarFred”
How 30 People Learned to Design a Zero Net Energy Home Last year the Northeast Sustainable Energy Association launched a year-round ‘Masters Series’ to extend the reach of popular Building Energy Conference. Marc Rosenbaum, one of the most popular presenters at the conference, taught a Zero Net Energy Homes course –… Continue reading “How 30 People Learned to Design a Zero Net Energy Home”
Preview of Powerful Commercial Solar Project Finance Model included in Solar Executive MBA Course If you are involved in selling or financing commercial solar projects and need a robust proven tool to value those projects, this model (which is included in our Solar Executive MBA course) will be useful to you and your business… Continue reading “Preview of Powerful Commercial Solar Project Finance Model included in Solar Executive MBA Course”
“How Do I Get the NABCEP Certification?” Step by Step Process for Getting the NABCEP Solar PV Installer Certification A question we get all the time is “How to do I get the NABCEP Solar PV Installer Certification?”. Instead of answering the question a million times, I wanted to create a definitive guide of all the talking points. Even… Continue reading ““How Do I Get the NABCEP Certification?” Step by Step Process for Getting the NABCEP Solar PV Installer Certification”
ASHP vs GSHP and The Importance of SEER and EER in Utility Air Conditioning Demand Side Management Programs Update: this article does not include the new regional efficiency standards that took effect on Jan 1, 2015. See this article on furnacecompare.com for updated definitions. The following post is by Mark Faulkenberry, Manager Marketing & Communications and Kalun Kelley,… Continue reading “ASHP vs GSHP and The Importance of SEER and EER in Utility Air Conditioning Demand Side Management Programs”
Performance Based Contracting is the Future of the Residential Geothermal Business. Prove Me Wrong (Screen shot of the Ground Energy Support Geothermal Monitoring dashboard) If you’re serious about geothermal, you need to be monitoring your projects in real time. Click here to buy a Ground Energy Support monitoring package. Note, I advise Ground Energy… Continue reading “Performance Based Contracting is the Future of the Residential Geothermal Business. Prove Me Wrong”
Renewable Energy Lessons From Harvard Business School’s Study on U.S. Competitiveness On November 15th, Harvard Business School hosted a discussion on ways companies and other stakeholders can boost U.S. competitiveness. It took place at The Henry Ford in Detroit, and the case discussion was about the rise, fall, and rise of… Continue reading “Renewable Energy Lessons From Harvard Business School’s Study on U.S. Competitiveness”
Top 10 Helpful Tips When Submitting A 1603 Grant Application This is a guest post by Rodman and Rodman. If you have any accounting questions related to renewable energy projects, the guys at Rodman and Rodman are awesome. Rodman & Rodman has prepared numerous 1603 applications and, based on our… Continue reading “Top 10 Helpful Tips When Submitting A 1603 Grant Application”
How New England Can Eliminate Oil Use For Single Family Homes for Less Than We’re Spending on Solar PV I first published this post in Renewable Energy World and it received a lot of comments, mostly getting into all the silly technical details of geothermal and not addressing how to implement policy to eliminate oil use. My hope is… Continue reading “How New England Can Eliminate Oil Use For Single Family Homes for Less Than We’re Spending on Solar PV”
The Most Complete List of Commercial Geothermal Cost Data This is a list of the best resources I’ve been able to find for commercial and public geothermal projects. We need to be creating more case studies in order to reduce risk for property owners. By showing property owners, specifically… Continue reading “The Most Complete List of Commercial Geothermal Cost Data”
Massachusetts = Large MW+ Solar Projects and Low SREC Prices In the Near Future I enjoy getting policy and finance updates at conferences from people who spend all day thinking about policy and finance. The 2012 Renewable Energy Vermont conference was no different. I also learned some great lessons about a community solar development… Continue reading “Massachusetts = Large MW+ Solar Projects and Low SREC Prices In the Near Future”
Community Solar Lessons Learned in Vermont – Jeff Forward @ Renewable Energy Vermont 2012 At the beginning of October, Renewable Energy Vermont held their annual conference. There were a number of amazing presentations and some struck me more then others. For the ones I really enjoyed, I decided to follow up with the presenters… Continue reading “Community Solar Lessons Learned in Vermont – Jeff Forward @ Renewable Energy Vermont 2012”