SolarCity Launches Residential Solar Services In Florida
In a blog post late last week, America’s leading solar energy provider SolarCity announced that it would be bringing its residential solar services to Florida, which is certainly related to the rejection of an anti-solar initiative on the ballot last month.
It’s been a big year for SolarCity, climaxing with the big news that Tesla has acquired the company, a move which was met with overwhelming approval by the boards and shareholders of both companies in November. However, it was a big year in other ways as well. Though the company had a rough start to the year, highlighted by a $250 million net loss in its 2nd quarter which led to co-founding brothers Lyndon and Peter Rive taking salary cuts down to $1 per year and being forced to lay off 108 employees, the second half of the year seems to have picked up for the company.
Over the past three months alone, SolarCity announced several financing agreements — a partnership with global bank Citi which will finance more than $347 million in solar projects; a partnership with Credit Suisse to finance more than $300 million in residential solar projects; and a $305 million round of financing from a private investment fund. In addition, since September, SolarCity has expanded its services into Austin, Texas and South Carolina.
So, it should come as no surprise that SolarCity, with a wave of energy buoying it, has announced it is expanding its residential services into Florida. From the company’s blog post:
Though the “Sunshine State” doesn’t get quite as much sun as the southwestern U.S., it consistently ranks among the nation’s ten sunniest states (the Orlando area, where we’re initially launching service, enjoys more than 230 sunny days each year).
As stated above, the move follows Florida’s rejection of the anti-solar Amendment 1 (details on voting results here), which according to SolarCity “would have made it easier for utilities to add fees to make solar more expensive for customers.”
SolarCity is aiming to initially serve customers of Duke Energy and Orlando Utilities Commission in the greater Orlando area, and will expand to additional areas throughout Florida over the coming months.
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