Massachusetts DOER Preliminary 2018 Compliance Obligation Announcement

On Wednesday, July 19^th, the Massachusetts Department of Energy Resources (DOER) announced the preliminary Minimum Standards and Compliance Obligations for 2018 Solar Carve-out (SREC-I) and Solar Carve-out II (SREC-II). The DOER notes that these numbers only represent preliminary estimates and final numbers will be released no later than August 30^th.

SREC-I

Based on current load capacity projections, the DOER estimates that the 2018 Compliance Obligation and Minimum Standard for the SREC-I Program will be approximately 838,995 MWh and  1.7903%, respectively, for load served under contracts on or after June 28, 2013.  If the 2017 SREC-I auction does not fully clear, these values will be increased to 857,423 MWh and 1.8296%, respectively.

For load served under contracts executed before June 28, 2013, the 2018 Minimum Standard will be 1.1411%.

SREC-II

The DOER estimates that 2018 Compliance Obligation and Minimum Standard for the SREC-II Program will be 1,347,902 MWh and 2.8762%, respectively, for load served under contracts before May 8, 2016. If the auction does not fully clear, these values will be increased to 1,591,279 MWh and 3.3955%.

To calculate this baseline Minimum Standard and Compliance Obligation, the DOER first determined the expected MWh/year that would have resulted had the SREC-II Program Capacity Cap remained 947.7 MW by:

1. Identifying the percentage share of MW capacity currently qualified under each SREC-II Market Sector;
2. Multiplying these percentages by the original 947.7 MW SREC-II Program Capacity Cap;
3. Multiplying these totals by (1) their respective SREC Factors, (2) a 13.71% expected capacity factor, and (3) 8,760 hours/year.

The DOER then summed these values and combined the remaining auction volumes and banked SREC-II volume from the 2016 Compliance Filings resulting in a total baseline Compliance Obligation and Minimum Standard.

In addition, the DOER estimates the Compliance Obligation and Minimum Standard for load contracts signed after May 8, 2016 to be 1,923,743 MWh and 4.1049%. respectively. If the auction does not fully clear, these values will be increased to 2,167,120 MWh and 4.6242%, respectively.

The official announcement can be found here.