08-05-2025
An uncertain time for solar, thanks to politics: Q&A with All Energy Solar CEO Michael Allen
President Donald Trump's budget request, released on May 2, 2025, proposes slashing $21 billion in unspent funds from the 2021 bipartisan infrastructure law for renewable energy, electric vehicle charging infrastructure and other efforts to cut climate-warming carbon dioxide emissions. Shown are solar panels and wind turbines. (Photo by Marga Buschbell-Steeger/Getty Images)
If you live in Minnesota, you may have already had an inkling, but a quick glance at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory's U.S. solar resource map confirms: Minnesota is among the least sunny states in the Lower 48.
Yet Minnesota gets a surprising amount of its electricity from the sun. It's in the top 20 for installed solar capacity overall and boasts the country's fourth-largest community solar program, thanks in part to a trailblazing 2014 law allowing customers to purchase shares in the smallish arrays that now dot warehouse roofs and farmland across the state.
More recently, residential solar has taken off in Minnesota as more utility customers — mostly but not exclusively in the Twin Cities metro — look to lessen their reliance on the electric grid. Few local enterprises have done more for those folks than St. Paul-based All Energy Solar, which helped kickstart the market in 2009 and now does business across the United States.
Solar power was still a novelty for most Minnesotans back then, but not for All Energy Solar co-founder and CEO Michael Allen.
Allen became fascinated with the technology in junior high school, wrote the business plan for his company-to-be in college at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and then spent several years in the 2000s learning the ropes as a California-based employee in BP's nascent solar division. (His brother and fellow All Energy Solar cofounder Brian Allen was one of the first employees of SolarCity, now a Tesla subsidiary.)
Today, solar power is the world's fastest-growing source of electricity. Deployments of large lithium-ion batteries to store excess power are rising quickly too. All Energy Solar installs both for a customer base that Michael Allen says is around 70% residential and 30% commercial.
But the U.S. solar industry also faces tremendous uncertainty thanks in part to stiff tariffs imposed by President Trump and instability around the future of generous federal tax incentives for clean energy equipment. SunPower, once one of the country's biggest solar installers, declared bankruptcy last summer; another, Sunnova, is in serious trouble.
The Reformer spoke with Michael Allen last month about the state of the solar energy industry, the state and federal legislation he's watching closely this year, and his not-sales pitch to solar-curious customers.
We actively say we don't have a sales pitch, to be clear. Most people come to us because they're interested in learning about solar. We listen to them and try to position ourselves as consultants who can help them solve their energy challenges.
A lot of that is education, focused on the basics of how the technology works, how it helps customers produce their own energy and pay less for electricity, and getting past some of the myths and misconceptions. No, you don't need a giant battery to make it work.
That said, it's still surprising when people ask us, 'Is this stuff for real?' Yes, solar energy is a multibillion-dollar industry. We're not doing it just for fun!
The Minnesota Senate's energy omnibus bill has some provisions that could harm the industry. The proposal to do away with Xcel Energy's Solar*Rewards program, the primary funding mechanism for Xcel customers who want to go solar. There are also provisions to kill net metering for customers of municipal utilities and electric cooperatives [reducing how much they get paid for excess electricity] and to discontinue the community solar program.
Less talked about are the unfair solar access fees charged by some Minnesota cooperatives, which I brought up in Senate testimony earlier this year. They're some of the highest in the country. We see solar access fees as potentially even more detrimental for rural solar customers than the proposed net metering changes. In effect, solar customers are charged an additional fee even if they never sell electricity back to the grid. It's like charging someone who installs LED light bulbs. My biggest concern is that we continue this approach of imposing fees instead of trying to come up with better rules.
In general, we need to get away from emotional thinking on energy policy. Policymakers and state energy regulators should take into account the countless data-driven studies showing the long-term value of customer-owned energy production. Right now, utility companies seem to be dominating the conversation and winning these battles, which in turn is stifling our ability to innovate toward a better energy system. We should be considering more ideas and working with utilities to test them.
We've worked with 400 or 500 different utilities across the country and Xcel is right up there with the most difficult, which is frustrating. Fighting each other on everything is not going to get us anywhere.
Our solution literally gives power back to the people, which not only makes customers more resilient but increases the grid's resilience as well. In turn, that avoids the need to build as much new infrastructure, like substations and power plants.
The problem is that investor-owned utilities make more money when they build new infrastructure. So they continue the traditional model of building big, centralized power plants. The technology [wind and solar power] might be newer and cleaner, but the model is the same.
Customers end up paying for this. We need to find a healthy balance before we get a snowball effect where more folks say 'I'm done,' and cut the cord, which increases costs for the remaining customers and ultimately hurts the people who can least afford to pay their bills. That's where we're headed if we continue to have an adversarial relationship with utilities.
We can. The solar industry is learning that we need to compromise, that we can't just have our cake and eat it too. We can't see ourselves as the only solution because we're just one of many.
The reality is, we build thousands of projects in Xcel's territory every year, which shows that we can work together. They — and we — are willing to come to the table.
We can do more, though. We would like utilities to be partners in allowing new solutions, like placing more customer-owned batteries on the grid to capture and store power for times when it's needed most. That's a powerful solution that utilities should value appropriately. We also believe utilities should value the non-energy benefits of customer-owned resources, like jobs and economic activity.
Yeah, it's concerning to hear [government officials] speaking out of both sides of their mouths. You can't say you want a manufacturing renaissance in the United States and then eliminate incentives for people to buy the products you want to make here.
[Editor's note: To pay for tax cuts expected to cost $4.5 trillion over 10 years, congressional Republicans are considering repealing or sunsetting tax incentives for buyers and manufacturers of clean energy products, including solar panels and grid-connected batteries. They're also mulling deep cuts to Medicaid.]
So if the tax credits are reduced or eliminated, we'll see a reduction in American manufacturing activity. That said, we believe that solar will continue to make sense regardless and that innovation could actually accelerate out of necessity in the absence of incentives. We'll see added pressure to make these products better and cheaper.
From a global perspective, the industry will continue to grow. Just look at China.
While I'm disheartened by some of the proposals under consideration in the state Legislature right now, I know that we have really intelligent, thoughtful lawmakers who are willing to fight for common sense. The House energy bill has none of the cuts proposed in the Senate, for example.
And I don't think the Senate wants to kill everything either. They want to make programmatic adjustments because they want a smart, cost-effective electric grid. They're just going about it differently.
That's policy. From a technology standpoint, I'm encouraged by the ongoing adoption of batteries for energy storage. It's happening fast, it's already making the grid stronger, and it's going to continue. We just need to push for a wider adoption of customer-owned and sited solutions so power continues to be put back into the people's hands.
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