SPI Insights

CPS (City Public Service) Energy, San Antonio’s city-owned utility, is planning to issue its official request for proposals (RFP) for the FlexPower Bundle energy projects later this year. CPS had been running a request for information, that was due by August 31, in preparation for the upcoming solicitation for its FlexPOWER Bundle and FlexSTEP initiatives.

These are the next steps in the utility’s Flexible Path strategy, that will help to supplement 1,700 MW of aging power generation capacity. The Flexible Path approach will help discover, explore, and implement new power generation and demand-side solutions over the next 20 years. The FlexPOWER Bundle RFP will seek to add up to 900 MW of solar, 50 MW of battery storage, and 500 MW of firming capacity.

This RFP comes on the heels of the decline in the federal Solar Investment Tax Credit, which has been vital to the growth of solar industry and has also aided in the deployment of energy storage in limited cases. The initiative originally gave solar developers a 30 percent credit toward their investment in the project. That credit dropped to 26 percent in 2020 and is scheduled to fall to 22 percent next year before decreasing to 10 percent in 2022 and beyond.