Additional details about First Solar’s ongoing dispute with bp plc and its Lightsource bp affiliate came out in a court document obtained by NPM.

First Solar filed a suit on September 30 in the Supreme Court for the State of New York against BP Solar, an owner and operator of utility-scale solar assets and its affiliate Lightsource, a developer, financier and operator of utility-scale renewable energy projects.

First Solar entered into eight separate purchase orders with BP Solar or Lightsource to purchase modules for use in their utility-scale solar projects between 2021 and 2023. First Solar filed the action on allegations that both parties refused to pay the amounts owed to it under those purchase orders.

As a result, First Solar was seeking damages of at least USD 405m for breach of contract, plus other costs as well.

bp plc and Lightsource had been required to answer the complaint by October 31.

bp plc, which reports its own quarterly earnings on November 4, declined to comment on the situation.

The pivot

While this dispute was unfolding behind the scenes, bp plc has been very vocal about trying to get new investors into the multi-lateral development platform even before it closed its acquisition in mid-2024 of the 50.03% of the Lightsource platform it did not already own, only to first pivot from that strategy, then reverse course and test the market again earlier this year.

Last November, bp plc announced that it transferred 2.4 GW of Lightsource’s US operational and construction assets into a joint venture owned between bp and Lightsource’s bp’s founders due to higher interest rates in the US. In a capital markets presentation given in February 2025, it then said it would group Lightsource projects geographically, then sell a majority stake into other investors.

However, NPM reported again, this past March, that bp plc reverted back to its original plan and teased a co-investment opportunity to the market for Lightsource.

Module dispute

First Solar alleges in the complaint that BP and Lightsource allegedly breached all eight supply agreements between 2024 and 2025, despite timely delivery of modules under those agreements.

The total purchase price under the purchase orders was USD 2.3bn, of which five were between Lightsource and First Solar and three were between BP Solar and First Solar. Both entities initially agreed to make down payments and then make additional payments as the modules were delivered.

The first breach came in the 2024 contract in which First Solar alleges the entities breached its contract when it failed to make the required payment of USD 78.7m for 275 MW of modules that were delivered and invoiced in March 2025.

First Solar said it took escalating actions to remind Lightsource of its lack of payment, but the company failed to cure its defaults, according to the complaint. Similar actions were taken on the other seven supply agreements.

First Solar said on its 3Q25 earnings call on October 30 that the contract covered module deliveries from 2026 through 2029. He said the modules were a mix of both international and domestic production, and more than half of the terminated volume was on domestic orders.

Executives said they received USD 61m in down payments on orders from BP affiliates. Now, the company is evaluating possibilities for the modules that would have been delivered to the BP affiliates before the contracts were terminated.

Repurposing them for other orders may prove difficult under current market conditions in the US, India and European fronts. First Solar’s CFO Alexander Bradley said on the call that issues may be “further exacerbated in the US, with our traditional utility scale customers experiencing transmission and permitting rate challenges, in large part due to the constraints reflected in the July Department of Interior memo related to renewables project development, the ongoing government shutdown and the impact of tariffs.”

NPM Interconnection queue data identified four US solar projects, developed by Lightsource bp, where interconnection agreements were executed and at an advanced stage. All four projects forecast commercialization dates between 2026 and 2027: Mayapple Solar in Pulaski County, Indiana; Canal Road Solar in Wayne County, Ohio; White Trillium Solar in Van Wert County, Ohio; and Fiddle Leaf Solar in Benton County, Arkansas.

*This story was originally published exclusively for NPM subscribers.

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