Today (Sept. 15) Duke Energy announced $500 million in new solar projects and purchases totaling 278 megawatts of solar power. However, the investments are largely for giant solar projects and Greenpeace observed that the company continues to fight against net-metering and provisions that would allow more access to solar power for all in the state.

The University of California (UC) is making the largest purchase of solar energy by a higher education institution. Earlier this week it announced that it signed agreements to supply 206,000 megawatt-hours per year (MWh/year) of solar energy to the California grid through solar farms totaling 80 megawatts of solar panels, for then next 25 years. 

Solar3D’s SUNworks division is now offering battery storage systems to its solar power customers. It joins a growing number of solar installers that are starting to offer energy storage systems in addition to their solar installations. 

Google has invested $145 million in SunEdison’s Regulus solar project, which is being built on a 743-acre southeast of Bakersfield, Calif. The site formerly hosted up to 30 oil wells, which tapered to five as the economically recoverable oil was exhausted. Now with a new solar array underway on the site the plant will provide clean energy for generations. 

Getting solar into more people’s lives is easier in more developed areas and places where utilities are public but in more rural areas or places where utilities are co-operatives it hasn’t been as easy. In many states the solar requirements for co-ops are much different than for public utilities. Hence the co-ops and their partners launched solar Cooperative Community Projects (sCOOP) last year and it's already made significant accomplishments in many states.

Following New York’s simplification of solar incentives for residents and businesses the state unveiled a new plan last week, K-Solar, to help New York’s schools go solar. Already 40 of the state’s school districts have signed up to participate in the program. 

The U.S. now has 15,900 megawatts of solar power installed. Fully 1,133 MWs of photovoltaics were installed in the second quarter of 2014. It’s the third consecutive quarter when more than 1 gigawatt of photovoltaics were installed in the U.S. and puts the country on track to install 6.5 gigawatts of photovoltaics this year, which is 36 percent more than last year (though slightly down from earlier estimates of 6.6 gigawatts). That’s the news from the latest U.S. Solar Market Insight Report, the quarterly report put out by the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA) and GTM Research. 

Working together five New England States in the Clean Energy States Alliance (CESA) have produced "Planning and Implementing a Solarize Initiative: A Guide for State Program Managers” to help states developing successful solar group-purchasing programs. The guide comes from the New England Solar Cost-Reduction Partnership, which consists of Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island and Vermont, and was established with DOE SunShot Initiative Rooftop Solar Challenge II program funding.

Last month Florida Power and Light’s solar hot water rebate program ended with an abrupt notice, earlier than anticipated. The Florida Solar Energy Industries Association (FlaSEIA) protested the cancellation with a letter to the state’s public utility commission, alleging that funds in the program weren’t spent and the utility took funds from the program. Now FPL has responded to the letter. 

Last week Austin’s City Council passed a new resolution that may make the Lone Star’s capital the nation’s biggest solar city—with 800 megawatts of solar power online by 2020. Fully a quarter of that power is likely to come from homes and  businesses, since the council carved out 200 megawatts of distributed rooftop generation by 2020. The balance, 600 megawatts of utility-scale solar power is slated for completion by 2017.