SMP 191: The Early Stages of the US Agrivoltaics Industry

In this episode of the Solar Maverick Podcast, Benoy interviews Peter Schmitt, Director of Project Development at US Solar. Peter shares insights on agrivoltaics, highlights the key states where US Solar is focusing its solar development efforts, and discusses emerging trends in the agrivoltaics industry. US Solar is a developer, owner, operator, and financier of solar generation and storage projects with a focus on emerging markets, agrivoltaics, and community solar programs with over 200 Megawatts of completed projects and over 2 Gigawatts in construction and development   Benoy Thanjan Benoy Thanjan is the Founder and CEO of Reneu Energy and he is also an advisor for several solar startup companies.  He has extensive project origination, development, and financial experience in the renewable energy industry and in the environmental commodities market.   This includes initial site evaluation, permitting, financing, sourcing equipment, and negotiating the long-term energy and environmental commodities off-take agreements. He manages due diligence processes on land, permitting, and utility interconnection and is in charge of financing and structuring through Note to Proceed (“NTP”) to Commercial Operation Date (“COD”). Benoy composes teams suitable for all project development and construction tasks. He is also involved in project planning and pipeline financial modeling. He has been part of all sides of the transaction and this allows him to provide unique perspectives and value. Benoy has extensive experience in financial engineering to make solar projects profitable.   Before founding Reneu Energy, he was the SREC Trader in the Project Finance Group for SolarCity which merged with Tesla in 2016.  He originated SREC trades with buyers and co-developed their SREC monetization and hedging strategy with the senior management of SolarCity to move into the east coast markets.    Benoy was the Vice President at Vanguard Energy Partners which is a national solar installer where he focused on project finance solutions for commercial scale solar projects.  He also worked for Ridgewood Renewable Power, a private equity fund, where he analyzed potential investments in renewable energy projects and worked on maximizing the financial return of the projects in the portfolio.  Benoy also worked on the sale of all of the renewable energy projects in Ridgewood’s portfolio.   He was in the Energy Structured Finance practice for Deloitte & Touche and in Financial Advisory Services practice at Ernst & Young.  Benoy received his first experience in Finance as an intern at D.E. Shaw & Co., which is a global investment firm with 37 billion dollars in investment capital. He has a MBA in Finance from Rutgers University and a BS in Finance and Economics from the Stern School of Business at New York University.  Benoy was an Alumni Scholar at the Stern School of Business.     Peter Schmitt Peter is a Director of Project Development focusing on US Solar's grid scale developments across the country, ranging from 50-300+ MW each.  He also spearheads the company's vegetation innovations, including the advancement of pollinator seed mixes, experimental crops, beehives, and the introduction of sheep to sites.  Prior to joining US Solar, Peter worked as an internal consultant at Xcel Energy in transmission, worked for a public utility in Austria, and founded a commercial compost company. Peter grew up in Minnesota and received two undergraduate and two graduate degrees, all from the University of Minnesota.   Stay Connected: Benoy Thanjan Email: [email protected]  LinkedIn: Benoy Thanjan Website: https://www.reneuenergy.com   Peter Schmitt Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/peter-schmitt-24187645/ US Solar Website:  https://www.us-solar.com/   Agrivoltaics Conferences in 2025 NORTH AMERICA'S AGRIVOLTAICS EXPO August 4-7, 2025 Chicago, IL https://solarfarmsummit.com   AgriVoltaics World Conference July 1-3, 2025 Freibrug, Germany https://www.agrivoltaics-conference.org/