Partner Spotlight: Scott Alexander, Eagle Solar & Light
A Purpose Driven Career
by Liam Davidson, Associate
Scott Alexander as a young volunteer in the Peace Corps—seen waving at the camera in Naivasha, Kenya.
Across the industry, it’s not uncommon to meet those whose professional careers have brought them to a variety of different jobs, fields, and places. Scott Alexander, Managing Director of Eagle Solar & Light, is no exception. Scott’s journey to Eagle Solar & Light’s arm in North Carolina began in the late 1990s as a Peace Corps volunteer in Kenya. Sunwealth Associate Liam Davidson sat down with Scott to learn more about his journey, building a purpose-driven business and how he envisions the future of clean energy.
On his “first experience in solar”:
Scott: I had my first experience in solar back in 1997. I was a Peace Corps volunteer in Kenya… At that point they paid you $140 a month. That was your stipend--no running water or electricity--life in a small village doesn’t take a lot of money! The idea was, how can I save some money? I could buy kerosene for a lantern, and D-size batteries for my tape player, or I could try something different. So I walked into this shop and—I don’t know what size it was, probably 10 watts—I bought a solar panel. And then somebody told me to buy a car battery, so I bought a car battery. I lugged that back to my house, maybe four miles, and at that time I had the mechanical aptitude of a box of rocks but there were only about four inputs. After fumbling around a couple of hours, the light turned on! And I was like, “yes, victory!”
So from 1997 through 1999, I used solar to power my radio and my houselights. And then funny enough, one of those years it was the World Cup in Paris, and one of my fellow teachers says to me “It’s the World Cup! We’ve got to watch it.” So he carried his TV four miles down that same dusty road. They would play two games in a row on Kenyan Broadcasting Company at night, so by halfway through the first game, the battery would start to die and the TV picture would go all wavy, and then it was basically radio with just sound. But back then I recognized how impactful solar could be--even though it was just some youngish men watching--or most of the time listening to--soccer on a TV powered by solar and a car battery.
So now, fast forward [to 2017] and I’m no longer in a government job [after serving as a long-time diplomat in the U.S. State Department and a variety of USG agencies in the international development space.] And I felt like, man, what do I do now? Luckily, during the time I spent in Tanzania, I had the opportunity to work on a $500 million energy program that included a five-megawatt solar farm. During that time, I had gotten a better sense of the financials of these sorts of projects, and I got to see again in solar an answer to that question—how can we save money?
Around this time I met Sam Yates, and Sam is the CEO of Eagle Solar & Light. I met him in Alabama, because that’s where I’m from originally too. And I sat with him, and he showed me, “wow, not only is solar good for the planet, but it’s pretty fantastic financially too.”
On Eagle Solar & Light’s membership in the Amicus solar cooperative:
Scott: When I go to an Amicus meeting, I come back excited and motivated and convinced we are making the world a better place. Amicus members just come across to me as smart, intentional, and purpose-driven people. Every time I leave, I feel smarter and like I’ve met a new personal connection.
And I think the other thing that we’ve come to appreciate as a company is, being relatively new, for a while we just kind of figured it out on our own. And many things we did right, but some we could’ve done better. With Amicus you meet and chat with people that do the same thing you do and they’re talking about, you know, their victories and their defeats and they give you their unvarnished view of everything that’s happening. We can call people up and say, ‘hey, we’re trying it this way,’ and they can say, ‘don’t, that’s a bad idea.’ It’s so cool to be members of a cooperative organization that share best and worst practices in our industry
Lastly, you know, I appreciate that you’re not just talking about solar with Amicus folks—you’re talking about justice, and equity, and the actions that improve all our lives. So the conversation becomes a whole lot more than just “use a four-inch conduit.” It’s about-- how do you succeed as a small business and do right by your customers, your employees, and society?
On Eagle Solar & Light’s recent solar projects with OWASA (the Orange Water and Sewer Authority), a nonprofit public service agency in Chapel Hill, NC:
Scott: It all starts with Mary Tiger, who is just one of those people who is so charismatic and who can just articulate a vision and get people on board with it. And it was her vision to reduce the amount of electricity they bought from the utility.
Now, the entire procurement and interconnection processes takes a long time here in North Carolina. Our conversation [with Mary] started at the end of 2018, and we didn’t get final approval until some point in 2019 to move forward with the interconnection process. And it’s about this time that we met Omar and Charley [CFO and General Counsel at Sunwealth, respectively.]
Now we said to them, “hey, these are the potential new leases,” and they took a look at them and liked them, and we were off to the races.
On working with Sunwealth:
Scott: So what’s good about Sunwealth as a financing partner? Well first off, you have the financial capacity to do these projects and we appreciate that Sunwealth has done the hard work of getting a group of investors ready to help.
Sunwealth and Eagle Solar & Light partnered together to build the OWASA solar installation in North Carolina.
Secondly, you all invest in projects that have more than just a financial return--it’s the larger impact that investment will have on a community. And that fits into Eagle Solar’s mission of expanding access to solar to the tax-exempt organizations like communities of faith and municipalities. Finally, it’s the flexibility and patience you all have as funders… just because something is a priority for me and a priority for Sunwealth, it doesn’t mean it’s a priority for the local inspector or whatever else it may be. So I think having a partner like Sunwealth that understands and is patient with us as this is a tough industry: lots of competition, and thin margins. Not only are you patient, but you all help us to succeed--and that support is invaluable.
On where solar is headed:
Scott: I think there’s some really strong tailwinds right now. Whether or not the ITC gets extended or bumped back up I don’t know, but things like the falling cost of storage are important. In a place like North Carolina, right now it doesn’t make a lot of financial sense for commercial storage, but as it becomes cheaper and there are more products available, I think that could be a game changer for the commercial and tax-exempt sectors. Grid-parity--meaning the cost of solar + storage is cheaper than you can buy from the utility--is coming.
I also think you’re going to see a lot more solar companies. For example, you just don’t see many national construction companies that dominate the market because there’s usually a preference for going local. And more local companies is good. That’s good for consumers because the market is just so competitive. It drives costs down and makes us constantly look for ways to improve. So will we continue to have lots of smaller shops like other Amicus members all over the country? Or are we going to see lots of consolidation and a few big players emerge and dominate? I think, and hope, it’s going to be more of the former.
Liam Davidson is an Associate at Sunwealth, and is passionate about building a cleaner, more equitable future for all of us to share. Outside of the office, Liam enjoys getting out for a row or a bike ride.