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Virginia’s debate over utility-scale solar has been characterized as an “us vs. them” battle, but new data shows more nuanced – and recently more encouraging – trends in solar approvals.
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Good morning and happy Friday,

This week brought some good news from the EIA, which reports that U.S. solar grew 30% in September 2025, providing almost 10% of the nation’s electricity, and over the past 12 months, the domestic battery fleet grew 59%, adding nearly 14 GW.

Over the Thanksgiving break, the EIA also reported that fewer U.S. solar projects are reporting delays, and that California’s solar surge continues to drive a steady decline of natural gas use in the state. 

The week before Thanksgiving, the House Natural Resources Committee approved the SPEED Act (although only two Democrats supported it). Among other things, the legislation could bar presidents from rescinding permits for energy projects, an amendment pushed by moderate Democrat Jared Golden. While passage of the bill in the full House may be relatively easy, it’s likely to face resistance in the Senate, and potentially from the White House. 

In other news, back in June, the French state-owned utility EDF announced it was considering the sale of a minority stake in its US renewables business; last week its CEO said the company is now contemplating selling "between 50% and 100%" of its U.S. renewable unit.

Read on for more.

Reversal of Fortunes


Virginia’s debate over utility-scale solar has been characterized as an “us vs. them” battle between urban Democrats who want clean energy and rural Republican communities that don’t want to host projects. The divide has sparked concern because it threatens the Commonwealth’s ability to meet its carbon-free electricity goals – not to mention power a growing fleet of data centers. Fortunately, new data shows more nuanced – and recently more encouraging – trends in solar approvals. Here are some highlights:

  • The University of Virginia finds that resistance to solar projects peaked in 2024, when Virginia localities rejected more solar megawatts (1,378 MW) than they approved (1,095 MW), bringing rejected capacity to double what it was in 2023. 

  • A recent solar project in Mecklenburg is something of a poster child for projects that have fallen victim to entrenched rural pushback; the project was dealt its final blow in October 2025, and earlier this year, the county passed an ordinance that effectively bans utility-scale solar projects.

  • That project’s fate notwithstanding, updated data through September 2025 show an encouraging reversal: localities approved 2,022 MW – more than any year except 2022 – and rejected 711 MW. Although the number of approved projects declined, those approved are larger, meaning megawatts gained still outpace losses. 

  • Another finding was that the degree of opposition varies by country; interactive mapping shows the counties with the most rejections – such as Sussex and Greenville – are also among those approving the most solar, suggesting that “these are not blanket rejections, but a case of county officials taking a closer look and distinguishing between projects they like and projects they don’t.”

⚡️ The Takeaway


Ravenous appetites. As noted above, Virginia is a hotbed for data center development, with 4,900 MW of current demand; “Loudoun County alone has 6,000 MW of data centers either in operation or in the works.” Given this, rejecting hundreds of megawatts of new solar seems ill-advised. That said, over the weekend, Microsoft’s CEO Satya Nadella cautioned that AI must earn ‘social permission’ to consume the vast amounts of energy it demands, “warning that the sector’s ravenous appetite for electricity could spark a public backlash.”

Betting Big on U.S. Solar


Austin, Texas-based T1 Energy is a vertically integrated U.S. solar + battery storage manufacturer listed on the NYSE that was (re)born in February of this year. The company’s origin story was driven largely by new foreign entity of concern (FEOC) rules that threaten to disqualify many solar and storage factories from receiving federal tax credits. Here’s a closer look:

  • Companies with any degree of Chinese ownership are particularly vulnerable to FEOC restrictions on domestic manufacturing incentives for clean energy. The Dallas facility that T1 now operates was originally built by China’s Trina Solar. By early 2025, the plant was producing at gigawatt scale. 

  • Even before the 2024 elections, however, Trina “saw the writing on the wall” regarding shifting political sentiment against Chinese companies’ benefiting from federal incentives. In December 2024, Trina sold the Dallas factory to Freyr Battery, which rebranded the operation as T1 Energy and headquartered it in the U.S. Trina retained only a 13.2% stake – well below FEOC thresholds, ensuring eligibility for lucrative “made-in-America” incentives. 

  • To reinforce its U.S. identity and avoid FEOC risks, T1 signed domestic supply agreements for polysilicon and steel, began importing cells only from non-FEOC countries, and launched major investments in U.S. solar-cell fabrication. Planned gigawatt-scale cell fabs in Texas, along with partnerships such as its stake in Talon PV, further anchor the company within an American-controlled supply chain.

⚡️ The Takeaway


Misunderstood but consequential. Of course, solar isn’t the only technology susceptible to FEOC risk – another worry is that the rules could create stranded energy-storage assets. Casey Butler, a lawyer who specializes in this topic, notes that stranding risk grows over time: a project compliant at commissioning may become non-compliant years later if replacement modules or spare parts originate from restricted entities; thus, routine maintenance or warranty replacements containing FEOC-linked parts could trigger tax-credit disallowance or recapture. Because many U.S. storage systems rely on Chinese cells, cathode materials, or software, FEOC compliance has become one of the most misunderstood but consequential risks in clean-energy finance. To manage these risks, projects must build meticulous supply-chain documentation, secure FEOC-compliant suppliers, and model downside scenarios.


A Plenitude of Perovskites


Here at the Dispatch we’ve been keeping our eye on the progression of solar cells that use perovskites, a family of materials that have shown potential for high performance and low production costs in solar cells.

Swift Solar is a U.S.-based manufacturing company specializing in perovskite solar cells. The company has announced a new partnership that marks a significant milestone for perovskite tandem solar technology, signaling its transition from laboratory success to real-world utility-scale deployment. 


Plenitude – controlled by Italian energy major Eni and targeting 15 GW of renewable capacity by 2030 – will pilot Swift Solar’s high-efficiency perovskite-silicon tandem modules at one of its U.S. solar facilities. Because major developers only run pilots when they see a clear path to commercialization, this collaboration represents strong industry validation of perovskite’s readiness for large-scale use.




The technology’s appeal lies in its performance: Swift Solar’s modules are expected to achieve 28% efficiency or higher, significantly above the 20%–24% typical for today’s silicon panels. That efficiency gap translates to as much as 40% more power from the same land area – an especially valuable advantage as electricity demand accelerates due to AI data centers, electrification, and grid expansion constraints. Higher output per acre also improves project economics by reducing land, racking, and balance-of-system costs.

The news is particularly exciting because it suggests that perovskite tandem technology – long viewed as the next frontier in solar – may finally be approaching commercial maturity. Swift Solar brings more than 40 patents and exclusive intellectual property from MIT, Stanford, and NREL, supported by $60 million in funding from private investors and U.S. agencies including DOE and DOD. 

If pilot testing confirms durability under utility-scale operating conditions, this partnership could accelerate the shift toward next-generation, U.S.-developed solar manufacturing and help unlock higher-density renewable power for a rapidly growing grid.
Thanks for diving into the Developer Dispatch with us.
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