Duke scales back solar ambitions amid cost concerns

US utility Duke Energy has been forced to scale back its $100,000 plan for distributed solar energy generation on rooftops following negative reactions from an independent arm of the North Carolina Public Utilities Commission and local businesses including Wal-Mart.

The utility, which announced plans in June to install $100m of solar panels on residential and commercial rooftops, has now proposed a scaled-down version of the plan, after concerns were raised about the cost of the proposals and the dominant position it would give the company in the region's emerging solar energy market.

Under the proposals, Duke planned to install solar panels at 850 locations, creating a distributed power station that would provide energy to the grid. All the equipment and energy generated would be owned by the power company which would pay a rental fee to businesses and households for the space used.

However, the plan prompted opposition from several local business groups and saw Wal-Mart file a testimony with the Commission arguing that Duke's ownership of the equipment and energy used in the scheme would create a monopoly on solar energy in the region.

Duke Energy then submitted a new proposal on 20 October that would see the number of sites cut from 850 rooftops generating 16MW to 425 generating 8MW and the cost of the project halved to $50m.

The Commission held a hearing on the new proposals three days later and Duke is hoping that it will issue a finding by early next year.

Duke spokesman David Scanzoni admitted the proposals had faced some opposition from local businesses, but insisted that the scaling back of the project was more to do with pushback from the Commission department than testimony by Wal-Mart.

"Within the Public Utilities Commission there's an arm called the Public Staff. They are charged with representing consumer interests," he said. "They thought the programme was too costly, so we in response agreed to reduce the programme to at least get the initial phase implemented, and so that's why we reduced it to the size we did."

He added that while the initial project would have cost North Carolina residents 34 cents per customer per month, the new proposals mean they will only pay eight cents.