Origis VP on staying ahead of supply chain constraints to secure growing portfolio

After a year in the role, Origis’ Vice President for Grid Power Business Development sees light on the horizon — and growth — even as supply chain constraints, grid bottlenecks, inflation and other risks continue.

The company has 25 operational projects in 12 states at the moment, primarily in the Southeast. But its 18 GW solar pipeline (plus 36 GWh of battery storage) is expected online by the start of next decade and will see the company developing utility-scale renewable energy projects in roughly 30 states across every RTO and ISO in the US, said Tanya Sessions in an interview with NPM.

Despite the challenges facing clean energy at the moment, sustainability goals and net-zero targets from utilities and commercial & industrial customers loom at the end of the decade and beyond, and continue to drive demand, according to Sessions.

“That requires a lot of projects, so we as an industry are actually seeing more demand than near term supply,” she said. “And that's what we're all rushing around and trying to deliver on.”

Planning is key, said Sessions, who started the role in September 2022 after stints with Siemens, Orsted, NextEra Energy Resources and GE. Origis has avoided contracting for supplies with companies impacted by tariffs, and secured panels for the next few years of its pipeline, Sessions told NPM.

In the last year, the company has announced significant PV panel purchase agreements with FirstSolar, Boviet and Maxeon. Origis has also made a point of warehousing high voltage breakers, transformers and more. As other developers follow suit, it could entrench some supply shortages, according to Sessions.

But it buys breathing room and certainty in the near term for a company with more than 5 GW of contracted projects over the next two to three years.

“We have publicly announced over six gigawatts of panel procurements that get us through our next few years of projects, and are continuing to negotiate well beyond that, to make sure that we can bring project certainty to our customers and our off takers,” she said.

Sessions’ experience in OEM sales, and on “both sides of the table” for service agreements, has given her a unique perspective of the supply chain constraints at the moment, and all that is involved to get from raw materials to fabrication to installation.

Despite some easing of fallout from COVID-19 shutdowns and the impacts of the Auxin tariff-investigations last year, Sessions said we are in “one of the most challenging points of our industry.”

The supply chain issue has morphed and, lately, centers on the “end miles” from port to project. Fuel prices and high demand are largely to blame.

“Panels are starting to make it through the ports, logistic costs are starting to come down, except for … the end part just due to diesel costs,” Sessions said.

Much of the continuing constraints involve parts like breakers and transformers that are also in demand by traditional utilities for transmission upgrades, large infrastructure projects, and “even manufacturing plants,” Sessions said.

“Those types of equipment, those supply chain constraints are still very prevalent,” she said. “You're still seeing transformer delays of over two years, costs up 40%.”

Sessions has found that while “banking hurdles” like capital market constraints and higher interest rates have added to the industry’s challenges, their offtakers have been understanding of their position, as evidenced by rising PPA prices and other trends.

Origis obtained a USD 750m warehouse credit facility earlier this year to fund the construction of 2 GW of projects in 15 states over the next three years.

Planning is all the more important given many of Origis’ prospective projects are in interconnection queues, like MISO, SPP and PJM, that are facing study delays or total system overhauls, adding years to CODs.

“Certain markets where you might not see an operating asset, it doesn't mean that we haven't been in that market for many years,” she said. “Again, it gets back to these interconnection queues and trying to make our way out of them.”

Antin Infrastructure, via its fourth flagship infrastructure fund, acquired a majority stake in Origis in October 2021.

*This story was originally published exclusively for NPM subscribers last month.


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