Sunnova Energy Corporation, provider of distributed, residential solar in Puerto Rico, has been working closely with its local partners and its Puerto Rican-based team to support its large base of solar customers on the island in the aftermath of Hurricanes Irma and Maria.
This spring, Sunnova will be reaching out to customers in Puerto Rico to offer a battery upgrade to their system, and, as a natural solar service evolution, moving forward, Sunnova will only be offering solar plus battery storage service contracts to ensure Puerto Ricans are supported through any future prolonged power outages. While no one can say when the next hurricane will come, solar + battery storage gets Puerto Ricans one step closer to being able to prepare for the unpredictable.
“Hurricanes Irma and Maria have impacted everyone across the island,” said Sunnova’s chief executive officer, William J. Berger. “For Sunnova, that impact has meant damage to solar systems and slower repairs and installs due to challenges in getting supplies to the island and reaching customer locations. However, our Puerto Rico-based team and partners have shown continued resilience and commitment and have worked tirelessly to overcome those challenges, assessing and repairing damaged solar systems as quickly as possible at no cost to our customers to ensure that their solar systems are able to generate solar power when the grid is back up and running.”
In response to changing market conditions, and to better fortify their existing, and future, customers on the island, Sunnova has also been focused on adding battery storage to its offerings to give customers the additional resiliency and reliability that batteries provide.
“While it has not been easy getting batteries to the island because of limited worldwide availability, we are working to create a pipeline to a product that will help prepare Puerto Ricans—who currently rely on the island’s troubled energy infrastructure—for the next inevitable storm,” said Sunnova’s Puerto Rico-based general manager, Karla Zambrana-Melendez. “No one should have to go one day, never mind more than 170 days, without power. We are offering solar + battery storage in Puerto Rico not only as a short-term strategy for the recovery and restoration of localized power, but to also create a more resilient and long-term power solution for the island’s energy infrastructure system. Our team has been working with our partners and suppliers to bring batteries to the market in the aftermath of the hurricanes, quickly implementing processes and procedures to do so in a very short time frame. The market demand in Puerto Rico is very clear—when the grid goes down again—which it will—people want to have resilient and reliable power. While no one can guarantee that homes and solar systems will remain intact after hurricanes, we know that solar + battery storage is much more resilient and reliable than the current utility’s energy infrastructure.”
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