North America PV Snippets: Blockstream, Leeward, SEIA, Duke

• Blockstream has announced $5 million investment from Square to support its plans to build an open-source, solar powered bitcoin mining facility
• Tri Global Energy will sell its 200 MW wind energy and 150 MW solar energy projects in Indiana to Leeward Renewable Energy
• SEIA has come out with a Diversity Suppliers Database to highlight minority, women, disabled, veteran, and LGBTQ+ owned businesses operating in the solar and storage industries
• Duke Energy has secured 3 VPPAs with 15-year duration each for a 250 MW solar project it plans to build in Texas as the company's largest solar project to date

Solar powered bitcoin mining facility: US based blockchain technology company that builds crypto-financial infrastructure based on bitcoin, Blockstream will build an open-source, solar powered bitcoin mining facility at one of its Blockstream Mining in the country. Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey's financial payments company Square will invest $5 million in Blockstream facility, the latter announced. It will be a proof-of-concept for a 100% renewable energy bitcoin mine at scale, explained Blockstream, with the economics of the build-out—including operational costs and ROI—made open to the public.

"We hope to show that a renewable mining facility in the real world is not only possible but also improved empirically that Bitcoin accelerates the world towards a sustainable future," stated Blockstream in its blog. "Our solar mining facilities are designed to be scalable enabling us to add additional capacity and support more participants to significantly expand renewable mining operations."

350 MW RE changes hands: Leeward Renewable Energy has signed an agreement with Tri Global Energy (TGE) to purchase latter's 2 utility scale solar and wind power projects in Blackford County, Indiana. The solar project will have up to 150 MW capacity while the wind energy facility will have 200 MW capacity. On completion scheduled for 2023, these projects are likely to produce enough clean energy to power more than 80,000 homes. In January 2021, Canadian pension fund OMERS backed Leeward bought 10 GW AC project development platform of First Solar (see First Solar Selling US Project Development Business).

Diverse suppliers database: The Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA) has released what it calls a free platform to highlight and elevate minority, women, disabled, veteran, and LGBTQ+ owned businesses operating in the solar and storage industries. The Diverse Suppliers Database, prepared with the help of Black Owners of Solar Services (BOSS), is a list of over 120 diverse-owned businesses, and will continue to add more names. According to the SEIA, this database will help solar companies 'more thoughtfully' consider their supplier networks and partnerships since it aims to enables users to sort, filter, and keyword search for diverse businesses that provide services in the solar and storage supply chain.

"SEIA's supplier diversity database will create business connections for company leaders across America and throughout the solar industry supply chain," said SEIA President and CEO Abigail Ross Hopper. "Solar companies are eager to implement business practices that create a more inclusive and diverse solar industry and this tool can support that goal."

250 MW solar project in Texas: Duke Energy said it will build its largest solar project to date with 250 MW capacity in Navarro County, Texas. The Pisgah Ridge Solar project has also secured a virtual power purchase agreement (VPPA) with Charles River Laboratories International Inc. (CRL) for 102 MW capacity of the project with 15-year validity. For the remaining 148 MW, Duke Energy said it has secured 15-year VPPAs with 2 other unidentified corporations. Moss will undertake engineering and construction work and bring the project online by 2022-end.