New Hampshire state official provides additional details about ongoing C&I RFPs
The RFPs for New Hampshire’s three C&I incentive programs closed on November 16, and scoring teams are in the process of evaluating applications.
“We aim to have all contracts in place with whoever the winning proposers are by the end of June (2024),” The New Hampshire Department of Energy’s Division of Policy Programs Director Josh Elliot said in an interview with NPM.
The two-step application process includes a first round for reserving funds and a second round for construction confirmations for three different types of C&I customers: solar, biomass and non-residential. Eligible entities have to register to generate mint renewable energy certificates.
The program's funding sources are alternative compliance payments from the state's renewable portfolio standard (RPS).
If a New Hampshire electric distribution utility or a competitive supplier decides not to purchase renewable energy certificates, companies make those alternative compliance payments.
Those installations then generate additional REC’s, resulting in fewer alternative compliance payments. However, this theory hasn’t worked in practice so far because there are five other New England states who have their own policy goals, Elliot said.
“But you have all the financial incentives in the world to actually go out and get the renewable energy certificates,” Elliot said. “In each of the three program years now that I've been here, we've always had sufficient money available for applicants to come in.”
C&I Solar Rebate
The C&I solar rebate program, averaging around 65 applications a year, provides 25% of total project costs or up to USD 10 thousand for installation of a solar array at a rate of $0.20 per Watt, which most applicants receive.
There’s also a solar thermal incentive of USD 0.12 per kBtu for new facilities with 15 collectors or less in size, or USD .07 per kBtu for new projects with more than 15 collectors.
Before the pandemic, this program averaged closer to 100 applicants a year. The number is growing again, but it hasn’t returned to normal.
C&I Wood Pellet Rebate
If C&I customers want to swap a heating source from fossil fuel generation to renewable biomass, New Hampshire has a C&I wood pellet incentive program, averaging about 5 or 6 applicants a year.
The maximum rebate incentive is USD 65,000, with a cap of 40% of the total cost for the eligible project.
There’s also an adder for a thermal storage tank hot water system or the installation of a revenue grade meter.
New Hampshire is the only state with Thermal REC’s, also known as TREC’s, to help transition heating away from fossil fuel fires.
C&I Non-residential Competitive program
For C&I projects that don’t fit the solar or biomass rebate programs, there’s USD 1.6m available for this program on a competitive basis.
“We've seen everything from combined heating systems as a centralized heating system for a school to residual heat to remove ice and snow,” Elliot said.
The office has also seen small scale hydro projects, usually one MW or less. Dams that are either not operational or not operating at peak capacity have received grants from this program to replace assets such as turbine components.
In 2021, there were 7 eligible proposals and USD 1.2m available, but the state only expended about 800 thousand of it.
In order to increase interest and ensure the same dollar amount available, the state posts the RFP around the same time every year.
The Goal
“The end result for all of these is that you're seeing a net increase in the number of renewable energy certificates being minted by a facility,” Elliot said.
The C&I incentive program started in October of 2010 and was modified by the APUC order in March of 2020.
Prior to the creation of the Department of Energy in 2021, these programs were part of the Public Utilities Commission.
The program now targets smaller projects of less than 1 MW.
Elliot also recently issued New Hampshire’s Solar for All application, and just completed the first round of stakeholder feedback.
“The only hiccup is, for most of these programs, we're not providing the full amount of funding for a project,” Elliot said. “One of the things we're going to be looking at in more detail going forward, especially as additional guidance comes out around these investment tax credits, is making sure we don't have a program or a project getting 120% — fully funded with a tax credit as well. That's not the point of the program. That’s not what we’re here to do.”
*This story was originally published exclusively for NPM subscribers last month.
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