By Frank Andorka, Senior Correspondent

What Happened:On a vote of 5-0, the Florida Public Service Commission has approved Sunrun’s request that its third party leases not be considered a sale of electricity and that:

Offering its solar equipment lease to customers in Florida will not cause Sunrun to be deemed a public utility under Florida law;

The residential solar equipment lease described in its petition will not subject Sunrun or Sunrun’s customer-lessees to regulation by the Commission.

SolarWakeup’s View: In a victory for third-party leasing in the state of Florida, Sunrun has JUST been granted the right to sell its products in the state of Florida.

Sunrun asked the Florida Public Service Commission in Decemeber to declare that its third-party ownership business model wouldn’t instantly make them a regulated utility or penalize their customers under the same rules. The Commission voted unanimously to approve the staff recommendation.

The unanimity of the decision was surprising, given the legendary power of the utilities in the state. Some observers fully expected a decision on the petition to be postponed for more discussion, even after Sunrun voluntarily submitted a copy of its lease in March for the commission to peruse.

During the brief discussion, Sunrun was asked about its Florida website and whether homeowners had access to it, to which Sunrun responded that they would once the company started operating in the state officially (which, it should be noted, required passage of the declatory statement the company requested).

Now that Sunrun has blazed the trail, I’d expect more third-party leasing companies to flood the state. After all, a 2008 report from the Florida Public Service Commission suggested there is the potential of a 52 GW solar resource in Florida that is not currently being exploited.

“The Commission’s vote to grant our petition is a critical step toward broadening access to solar energy for Floridian households,” said Anne Hoskins, chief policy officer of Sunrun. “We are grateful for the time the Commission and technical staff spent promptly reviewing our petition and our Florida lease product and look forward to bringing additional solar energy choice to more people in the Sunshine State soon.”

“Sunrun is delighted to now be able to offer Floridians the opportunity to lease a solar system, enabling them to have clean, reliable, affordable solar power for their homes,” said Lynn Jurich, CEO and co-founder of Sunrun.

This article was edited at 10:45 am on 4/20/2018 to add comments from Anne Hoskins, chief policy officer of Sunrun.

This article was edited at 1:48 pm on 4/20/2018 to add comments from Lynn Jurich, CEO and co-founder of Sunrun.

More:

FPSC Staff Recommendation:

Original Sunrun Petition