The future of solar energy in South Carolina is glowing with potential, as highlighted in The Economic Impact of the Solar Industry in South Carolina. This report, prepared by Dr. Joseph C. Von Nessen of the University of South Carolina, offers a compelling look at how the state’s solar industry is poised to deliver profound economic benefits while helping meet rising energy demands.
By 2035, the solar sector is projected to quadruple its current annual economic impact, injecting up to $19 billion into the state’s economy over the next decade. This growth in the solar sector will create more than 3,000 jobs and stimulate South Carolina’s economy while utilizing a maximum of 1.4 percent of agricultural land, allowing the state to position itself as a leader in solar development.
The Palmetto State has every reason to embrace a bright, sustainable energy future, but a lot has to happen for South Carolina to take advantage of this potential.
Is South Carolina ready for solar growth?
Legislative and utility program opportunities exist. Is the workforce ready? What about other land options besides agricultural land?
Legislation and Utility Programs
House legislation has been pre-filed to help move things forward. It is now up to legislators to ensure that renewables legislation will continue accelerating solar generation in South Carolina.
In addition to legislation, utility programs can be an opportunity or a roadblock for solar growth. Programs such as Duke Energy’s PowerPair, being piloted in North Carolina, can boost the opportunity to generate electricity from solar. Residents, public entities, businesses, and industry would all benefit from this opportunity. These programs need to be opened up to provide this opportunity to make these entities resilient.
Workforce
With this growth comes a need for more people in the solar industry to install, sell, and fulfill management and administrative roles at solar companies. Is South Carolina ready? Are the technical colleges and universities providing solar workforce training? Are high schools educating on renewable energy? There are great programs at Coastal Carolina University, Lexington Richland 5, and Richland School District Two; and new programs like the one by Solar United National are also paving the way for the solar workforce. The South Carolina Energy Office is a great resource for energy workforce training.
Let’s learn from these programs, expand education, and grow the solar workforce so South Carolina is ready for the demand.
It’s not just agricultural land
This new report acknowledges that 1.4% of agricultural land is a conservative estimate, which is correct. In addition to agricultural land, solar can also be installed on the roofs of homes, multifamily buildings, communities, churches, commercial buildings, land adjacent to churches, warehouses/distribution centers, roofs of industrial facilities, land adjacent to industrial facilities, military bases, healthcare facilities, etc.
South Carolina’s future is so bright we have to wear shades. Let’s harness this sun to generate electricity and usher in a bright future for the next generation.
The post South Carolina’s Solar Future is Bright appeared first on SACE | Southern Alliance for Clean Energy.
Weather Guard Lightning Tech
CIP Buys Ørsted EU Onshore Wind
Allen covers CIP’s €1.44 billion buyout of Ørsted’s European onshore wind, the new Perigus Energy name, and Vestas paying €506 million for its stake in the firm.
Sign up now for Uptime Tech News, our weekly newsletter on all things wind technology. This episode is sponsored by Weather Guard Lightning Tech. Learn more about Weather Guard’s StrikeTape Wind Turbine LPS retrofit. Follow the show on YouTube, Linkedin and visit Weather Guard on the web. And subscribe to Rosemary’s “Engineering with Rosie” YouTube channel here. Have a question we can answer on the show? Email us!
In Denmark, there is an old expression. “What goes around comes around.” The founders of Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners — known in the industry simply as CIP — know exactly what that means.
Back in 2012, four executives were fired from DONG Energy, the Danish energy giant that would later rebrand itself as Ørsted. Their offense? Their paychecks were considered too large. So large that DONG Energy’s own CEO was forced out as well. Four men shown the door were. A year later, a woman joined them from that same company. The Danish press had a name for these five. They called them “the golden birds.”
With six billion Danish krone from the pension fund PensionDanmark, they launched what is now one of the world’s largest clean energy fund managers.
In 2020, turbine maker Vestas purchased a 25 percent stake in CIP. The deal included a performance-based earn-out arrangement. This week, the books revealed the size of that windfall.
The five partners have now collected a combined 1.8 billion Danish krone — roughly 240 million euros. Vestas expects to make one final payment of 71 million euros this year. Including interest, Vestas will have paid 506 million euros for its stake in CIP. Not a bad return for a group of people who were shown the door.
And. This week, CIP completed its acquisition of Ørsted’s European onshore wind business for 1.44 billion euros. They renamed it Perigus Energy. The new company holds 826 megawatts of wind and solar capacity, operating in Ireland, Germany, the United Kingdom, and Spain.
Let that circle close. The executives fired from DONG Energy — the company that became Ørsted — just bought Ørsted’s business.
Meanwhile, CIP’s annual report for 2025 tells the story of a company in transition. Profit for the year came in at 561 million Danish krone, down from 683 million the year before. The employee count fell by nearly a fifth, to 441 people. And yet, their CI Five fund closed this year at 12.3 billion euros — the largest greenfield renewable infrastructure fund ever raised. Looking ahead, CIP expects profit of 600 to 800 million Danish krone in 2026 as new fund closings take shape.
So the picture this week is this. The men and women once considered overpaid, at a company that no longer carries the same name, have built the world’s largest greenfield renewable energy fund. And they now own a piece of the legacy that fired them.
The golden birds are still flying.
And that is the wind energy news for the fourth of May, 2026. Join us for more on the Uptime Wind Energy Podcast.
Here’s Lucy Biggers, social media powerhouse, explaining how solar and wind energy actually aren’t free, because they require materials that need to be mined from the Earth.
Yes, Lucy. I think most of us already knew that.
It’s hard for me to understand how a person with zero training in science has any relevance to what climate scientists are telling us. If I want a good recipe for carrot soup, I don’t ask a baseball coach or an auto mechanic.
They call this woman an “influencer.” What type of idiot does she influence?
Yes, part of this is stupidity. But a larger part is that people who still support Trump at this point are desperate to believe whatever comes out of his mouth, regardless of how nonsensical it may be.
I wish my mother were still here so I could see where she would stand. She was extremely well-educated, and a voracious reader, but somehow remained a Fox News viewer until the end. I just wonder if the last 15 months may have turned her around.
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