The Community Power Accelerator Prize is a $10 million, three-phase prize designed to fast-track the efforts of new, emerging, and expanding solar developers and co-developers to learn, participate in, and grow multiple successful community solar projects. The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Solar Energy Technologies Office (SETO) is launching Phase 1 of the Community Power Accelerator Prize Round 2.
Through this prize, DOE seeks to increase the number of equitable community solar projects by providing:
Tools and resources to connect developers with private sector project financing for community solar
projects using a standardized process.
Training to build understanding of the full cycle of community solar development, including site
acquisition, community relations, customer acquisition, financing, costs, and the unique challenges
and benefits of a community solar model.
Free consulting services for competitors on the steps necessary to get a community solar project
financed.
Coaching on expanding developers’ solar customer markets to include low- and moderate-income
populations, disadvantaged communities, and local workforce development, as well as increased resilience to power outages and household savings to make community solar projects attractive to the widest range of customers possible.
By the end of the prize, competitors will be ready to engage with the Community Power Accelerator online platform,1 which provides a place for competitors to shop their credit-ready projects around to verified project developers, investors, and philanthropic organizations.
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