Thirty-two proposed commercial solar projects in Oregon would use third-party financing.

As if the expiration of the federal solar investment tax credit in December wasn’t giving the solar industry enough to sweat over, a joint filing by one of Oregon’s largest private utilities and Honeywell International has essentially halted any future projects within the state from moving forward.

Pacific Power, a subsidiary of PacifiCorp, which is owned by MidAmerican Energy Holdings Co. (NYSE: BRKA) and is the state’s second-largest electric utility after Portland General Electric (NYSE: POR), and Honeywell in June filed a joint petition with the Oregon Public Utility Commission concerning the development of solar energy projects funded by third-party financers.

The filing asks the PUC to clarify whether third-party financers who own the solar power systems but sell the power generated from them to the “host” organization are subject to the same net-metering laws as a conventional solar system owner. The state’s  net-metering law allows customers with renewable energy projects to connect to the existing electric grid and sell excess power to their utility; the question is, does the law allow third-party financers to tie into the grid and the host organization to therefore sell excess electricity to their utility? If not, host homeowners and businesses would have to disconnect their panels from the grid.

“They couldn’t have picked a worse time,” says Philip Krain of Commercial Solar Ventures, a Portland-based commercial solar developer behind the “flip” solar financing model. “And I think they know that. With the issues around the investment tax credits, they are giving a below the belt shot to the people working hard in the solar industry to try to get this industry going.”

More than 80 percent of the commercial solar projects working with the Energy Trust of Oregon include third-party investors, reports the Oregonian. They are all seeking state tax incentives as well as federal tax incentives. The combined capacity of such proposals is 13 megawatts, which is more than twice the capacity of solar electric projects installed in Oregon to date.