Starbucks recently announced an investment in a three-project renewable energy portfolio comprising wind and solar farms in North Carolina, Oklahoma and Texas from developers Allete Clean Energy, Apex Clean Energy, BayWa r.e., and Cypress Creek Renewables.
The portfolio, built for Starbucks using LevelTen Energy’s technology-enabled procurement platform, aggregates three strategically-located power purchase agreements (PPAs), each with nearly-identical terms, from three project developers. The PPA portfolio will provide clean power to the electricity grids that serve more than 3,000 US Starbucks stores and communities by 2021, when all three projects are online.
The portfolio incorporates 146 total megawatts from three new renewable energy projects: 50 megawatts of wind power from an Allete Clean Energy project in the SPP market, acquired from Apex Clean Energy; 50 megawatts of solar power from a Cypress Creek Renewables project in the ERCOT market, and 46 megawatts of solar power from a BayWa r.e. project in the PJM market.
As more corporate and industrial entities seek to procure renewable energy, longtime buyers help guide the industry by supporting innovative PPA deal structures. According to LevelTen, the portfolio model — much like a mutual fund — minimizes risk and allows buyers to capture the scale pricing benefits of the country’s largest, most economically attractive projects.
The Starbucks’ portfolio was created by LevelTen Energy’s Dynamic Matching Engine, software that curates and analyzes massive data sets on clean energy projects under development. This technology, along with the deep market expertise of LevelTen’s team, identifies optimal available project combinations for individual corporate buyers. Companies can then execute PPA contracts, individually, independent of other corporate buyers, or they can choose to partner, explicitly, with other buyers.
