Bright Spots Of Solar Energy Cut Through The Clutter

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For anyone who missed the warnings about Project 2025 last year, here we are in 2025 and it’s all true. Nevertheless, the US solar energy industry is still an industry regardless of the chaos touched off when President Trump took office on January 20, and solar developers are taking advantage of new financial instruments to keep the momentum going.

The US Solar Energy Industry Is Still An Industry

Among the first flurry of orders issued from the White House since January 20 was a blanket work stoppage impacting renewable energy projects on federal lands and waters.

That pretty much halted the US offshore wind industry in its tracks, but private property is still in play along with lands and waters under state and local jurisdiction.

With that in mind, let’s take a look at the US startup Hecate Energy. The company launched in 2012 and it already has 11 gigawatts of solar energy and energy storage projects under its belt with a focus on power purchase agreements, a relatively new instrument authorized by the Energy Policy Act of 2005 (see more PPA background here).

The Hecate pipeline is stuffed with 47 more gigawatts. Among the forthcoming projects is Sunfish Solar 2, a 360-megawatt array planned for Lee Township in Calhoun County, Michigan. Earlier today Hecate announced that the firm Bechtel has begun initial work at the site towards a completion date by Q2 2026. The clean kilowatts will support the 8-gigawatt solar target of its partner in the project, the firm Consumers Energy.

Consumers Energy assigns extra solar energy to its customers the old fashioned way, through an opt-in program. These voluntary ratepayer programs were more common in the early 2000’s, when the cost of solar energy was relatively high. Ratepayers who wanted to shed their reliance on fossil energy had to be willing to pay a premium for renewables.

Nowadays utilities like Consumers Energy are adding solar energy to their routine portfolio. Still, Consumers notes that its grid mix currently consists of just 15% renewables. Ratepayers who want to add more clean kilowatts can opt into the company’s Renewable Energy Subscription Plan.

Global Financiers Bring (Lots) More Solar Energy To US

Another Hecate project of note is the forthcoming 674 MW (DC)/500 MW (AC) Cider project in New York State’s Genesee County. The latest iteration of an ongoing development partnership between Hecate and the New York firm Greenbacker, Cider is billed as the biggest solar energy project in New York to date.

On January 27, Greenbacker announced that it acquired the array and closed a financing package that marks the start of construction, with a healthy assist from the global financial community.

“Greenbacker partnered with six of the world’s leading project finance banks and financial institutions to secure $869 million in construction-to-term, letter of credit, and tax equity bridge loan financing and with a global investment manager for an additional $81 million development loan facility,” the company stated on January 27. Loan facility refers to an arrangement that enables a borrower to access a series of loans without having to go through the entire application process each time.

Participating in the financial arrangements were MUFG (Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group), KeyBanc Capital Markets, ING Capital, the New York Branch of Intesa Sanpaolo, Societe Generale, and Wells Fargo.

The finance package also included an $81 million development loan with Voya Investment Management, to support the Cider project from late-stage development into the preliminary construction and equipment procurement phases.

Greenbacker notes that the total package of almost $1 billion represents its biggest project financing to date, indicating that the firm has its sights set on even bigger deals in the future.

“Greenbacker’s successful closing on this development loan facility and the bank syndicate’s construction and long-term facility is a pivotal achievement for our organization,” explained the firm’s Head of Capital Markets, Carl Weatherley-White.

“Finalizing $950 million in capital to build the largest solar project in New York is a testament to the deep expertise and dedication of all parties involved,” he added.

Financial Innovations Are Coming For Your Fossil Fuels

High finance is also at work in the community solar field. Community solar projects are aimed at providing access to solar energy for all local ratepayers, including those without the means or opportunity to install solar panels on their own property.

In past years community solar subscribers could expect to pay a premium. Today, some subscribers actually save money on their utility bills. Community solar projects are also of interest because they tend to be small in scale and locally sited, supporting grid resiliency by adding to a utility’s distributed energy resource portfolio.

Earlier this morning, for example, the community solar firm Encore Renewable Energy nailed down an innovative $389 million transaction with the firm Brookfield, aimed at growing its both its solar energy and energy storage profile.

“This deal employs a pioneering approach that meets the complete capital requirements for constructing and expanding a distributed generation portfolio through combined non-dilutive debt and tax equity facilities,” Encore explains. “The financing structure integrates construction-to-term debt and a tax equity bridge within a single debt facility, complemented by a preferred equity facility dedicated to tax equity financing.”

Encore co-CEO Blake Sturcke offers this plain-language translation:

“This is a transformational moment for Encore as we enter the next phase of our strategic transition into an IPP. With this funding, we are now poised to meet the rapidly growing energy demand across numerous US markets with clean, reliable, and cost-efficient power generation and storage solutions.”

The Managing Partner and co-Head of Brookfield’s infrastructure debt and structured solutions businesses, Hadley Peer Marshall, notes that the individualized financing package is just for starters.

“This transaction is a good example of the significant interest we have seen for capital solutions in the renewables sector, driven by the growing demand for power,” Marshall explains. The company’s CFO and CIO Chris Clement also emphasized that the $389 million deal is not a one-off.

“We are confident that Brookfield represents the ideal financing partner as we continue to scale as a distributed generation IPP,” Clement said.

“Our organizations share a strong alignment in co-developing these forward-looking facilities, and we approached this financing with the intention of establishing a streamlined and strategic partnership—one that would provide the operational agility essential for our continued growth,” he added.

Hecate, Encore, and their financial partners are just two examples of the forces keeping the solar energy ball rolling in the US. In the meantime, the Trump administration has proven itself competent at sowing chaos  and nothing else. On the afternoon of January 29, for example, the White House stated that the blanket funding freeze it ordered for federal agencies is still in effect, even though it is not. The Office of Management and Budge issued a memo ordering the freeze effective January 28, only to rescind it on January 29 after a judge temporarily halted it. Twenty-three state attorneys general and other parties also sued to block the freeze.

By the end of the day on January 29 a federal judge was considering a restraining order against the White House, too.

For all its bluster, the White House will panic and backtrack when called to account. As for who does the calling to account, anyone with a phone and/or an Internet connection can lend a hand. It’s fun, it’s free, and it’s better than sitting on your hands. You can look up your representatives in Congress here.

I’ve been sending email messages to my representative in the House and circulating copies, so others can use them as boilerplates. Not everyone has time to compose a letter but anyone can copy/paste. If you have a favorite action step to share, drop a note in the comment thread.

Follow me via LinkTree, or @tinamcasey on LinkedIn and Bluesky.

Photo: The US solar energy and energy storage developer Hecate has 11 gigawatts of solar and storage under its belt and 47 more gigawatts in its pipeline (courtesy of Hecate).