In a world desperate for new electricity generating sources of power, speed is essential in utility-scale solar. Too many projects fail from the knock-on effects of extended timelines in the pre-construction phase – the so-called “Valley of Death.” Solar design software is one tool that mitigates pre-construction phase risks without compromising speed or accuracy.
Compounding pressures during pre-construction
The clean energy boom has opened new doors to utility-scale solar, creating affordable access to clean power and supporting an aging U.S. grid. Still, the boom is not without its drawbacks, including intensified pressures on solar stakeholders.
- As demand for solar soars, so does the demand for solar engineers. The proliferation of new projects has made it harder to find, hire and onboard highly skilled and experienced engineers.
- The pre-construction phase entails regulatory hurdles, escalating costs and the need for data-intensive analysis – creating operational friction between ambitious timelines and slower legacy processes.
- External pressures are not the only risks impacting solar builds. Rapid growth reveals pre-existing bottlenecks, limitations and inefficiencies in internal workflows.
What’s more, compressed deadlines and multi-year interconnection queues can jeopardize tax credit eligibility and overall project viability. By prioritizing precise engineering and automated processes from the earliest stages, developers can build the resilient foundation necessary to survive mounting compliance pressures and financing uncertainty and shorten the path to commercial operation date (COD).
How MCE leveraged a solar design tool to streamline greenfield development
Mission Clean Energy (MCE) is a utility-scale solar and storage developer focusing on greenfield development, handling interconnection, permitting and real estate, including capacity analysis.
Challenges:
During pre-construction, MCE had been outsourcing design work, then utilizing an in-house team using AutoCAD for site layouts.
Full engineering was accurate, but the process was slow. On top of this, AutoCAD was rigid and had limitations in integrating third-party data. And without solid grading analysis, securing sites was a process rife with risks, including unbuildable land or prohibitively expensive grading requirements.
MCE sought a more comprehensive solution that provided highly accurate grading analyses, integration with geographic information systems (GIS) data and speedy iterations with different equipment and ground covering ratios (GCR).
Solutions:
MCE implemented PVFARM’s web-based solar design software into its tech stack. It provides GIS data integration and allows the pre-construction engineering team to conduct all initial site layouts, grading assessments and buildability assessments in house.
With this new approach, the integration of takeoffs into MCE’s cost modeling has improved the quantification of inputs, helping to rationalize top-down cost estimates with a bottoms-up view. The MCE team also leverages PVFARM’s topographical tool for buildability assessment. Export data is sent to AutoCAD for third-party engineering, such as civil engineers for drainage or grading, and to their internal costing tool for cost modeling and sanity checks. The coordination improves overall workflow and decision-making efficiency.
Site example:
In a key project, MCE assessed land options that included wetlands on one parcel, topography challenges on another and acreage downsizing on a third. With solar design software, the team utilized integrated terrain analysis, which allowed MCE to analyze grading risks immediately, instead of waiting for a civil survey.
MCE was then able to develop a detailed understanding of different land positions’ engineering and economic trade-offs. This process didn’t just speed up drawing lines, it gave MCE the ability to run rigorous grading, layout and cost scenarios in real-time. The result was a multi-faceted view of the options with weeks of time savings in the process.
Improvements and benefits:
- Mission Clean Energy reduced analysis time from days or weeks to mere hours, and saw an average 20% time savings on layouts and assessments.
- The efficiency creates more space to evaluate additional opportunities and scenarios, freeing up engineering time and focus and driving more definitive decisions.
- Onboarding is more streamlined as new hires can plug into efficient processes from the start.
- The solution has enhanced engineering packages for counterparties, smoothing project sale processes and preventing design-related delays.
- The solutions are far more comprehensive: instead of one-off design representations, the team offers a thoughtful portfolio of engineering analyses and tradeoffs on various land positions.
In greenfield development, there are significant opportunity costs involved in analyzing sites that turn out to be unviable. There are also tremendous risks involved in going forward with sites that may have civil “blind spots,” which turn into expensive and time-consuming problems down the road.
Accurate, high-fidelity engineering in the prospecting phase is one of the most important factors in on-time, no-surprises, no-budget-escalation projects. Typically, stakeholders don’t have the luxury of time, robust engineering staff and/or financing available at this stage to pursue this level of engineering without additional resources.
Solutions that empower engineers to make decisions and recommendations faster and with more accuracy are crucial to mitigating “Valley of Death” risks. With roughly one-third of siting applications getting canceled and another 50% experiencing delays, there is no margin for error in prospecting. Pre-construction efficiency, accuracy and insight can improve these percentages – driving projects to succeed rather than stall.