BRIDGES TO NEW SOLAR BUSINESS MODELS: OPPORTUNITIES TO INCREASE AND CAPTURE THE VALUE OF DISTRIBUTED SOLAR PHOTOVOLTAICS

The report argues that the U.S. distributed solar photovoltaics (DPV) market must shift from customer-centric value models to system-wide value models to sustain growth and meet SunShot Initiative targets. It proposes three 'bridge' business model building blocks: increasing access via subscription and community models, treating DPV as a grid resource through optimized siting and production, and bundling DPV with other distributed energy resources (DER) for resilience. The document emphasizes that achieving these goals requires collaboration between utilities and solar companies to reduce soft costs and capture operational benefits post-interconnection.

• Current U.S. solar generation is low at 0.2% of total electricity, but the Department of Energy’s SunShot Initiative has set targets for solar to provide 14% of generation by 2030 and 27% by 2050.
• The DPV market faces significant growth barriers due to the exhaustion of incentive program funding, net energy metering (NEM) market caps, and the scheduled decline of the business investment tax credit from 30% to 10% at the end of 2016.
• Existing DPV business models are primarily customer-centric, which has led utilities to view DPV negatively in terms of revenue loss, grid operation challenges, and transaction costs.
• To increase the net value of DPV, stakeholders should focus on reducing 'soft costs'—such as permitting, inspection, interconnection, and customer acquisition—and optimizing production timing and location to increase capacity value.
• The report proposes three 'bridge' business model building blocks: 'Increased Access' (e.g., community solar and subscription models), 'Distributed Solar as a Grid Resource' (optimizing siting and integrating advanced inverters or storage), and 'Technology Bundles' (combining solar with other DERs for services like resilience).
• Successful implementation of new business models requires a multi-stakeholder approach to create standardized methodologies for valuing DPV and improving data transparency and accessibility.

APA

RMI (2014). BRIDGES TO NEW SOLAR BUSINESS MODELS: OPPORTUNITIES TO INCREASE AND CAPTURE THE VALUE OF DISTRIBUTED SOLAR PHOTOVOLTAICS. https://rmi.org/app/uploads/2017/05/RMI_Document_Repository_Public-Reprts_2014-34_ISBMFinalReportExecSumm.pdf

Chicago

RMI. BRIDGES TO NEW SOLAR BUSINESS MODELS: OPPORTUNITIES TO INCREASE AND CAPTURE THE VALUE OF DISTRIBUTED SOLAR PHOTOVOLTAICS. 2014. https://rmi.org/app/uploads/2017/05/RMI_Document_Repository_Public-Reprts_2014-34_ISBMFinalReportExecSumm.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |author=RMI |title=BRIDGES TO NEW SOLAR BUSINESS MODELS: OPPORTUNITIES TO INCREASE AND CAPTURE THE VALUE OF DISTRIBUTED SOLAR PHOTOVOLTAICS |date=November 2014 |url=https://rmi.org/app/uploads/2017/05/RMI_Document_Repository_Public-Reprts_2014-34_ISBMFinalReportExecSumm.pdf |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{rmi2014bridges, author = {{RMI}}, title = {{BRIDGES TO NEW SOLAR BUSINESS MODELS: OPPORTUNITIES TO INCREASE AND CAPTURE THE VALUE OF DISTRIBUTED SOLAR PHOTOVOLTAICS}}, institution = {RMI}, year = {2014}, month = nov, url = {https://rmi.org/app/uploads/2017/05/RMI_Document_Repository_Public-Reprts_2014-34_ISBMFinalReportExecSumm.pdf}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }