Investors, developers, software providers are encouraged to participate
SunSpec Alliance and XBRL US announced today the launch of a 30-day public review period for the initial draft of Orange Button data standards for solar financing. The digital dictionary of terms, called a taxonomy, was developed as part of the U.S. Department of Energy SunShot Initiative’s Orange ButtonSM program (https://energy.gov/sunshot) that aims to make it easier to aggregate and share solar data, facilitating more efficient and cost-effective financing of distributed energy projects. SunSpec Alliance heads the Orange Button project team that is tasked with establishing an open, easy-to-adopt, solar data architecture, and standards.
“Standardizing data collection is a critical means to reduce the soft costs of solar financing,” said Tom Tansy, Chairman of SunSpec Alliance, “All solar energy stakeholders owe it to themselves and their businesses to review the standards and give us feedback. Every participant has a chance to influence the final standards that will be the industry norm in solar financing. That will benefit participants’ companies, and ultimately, the entire industry.”
The XBRL data standard was chosen for Orange Button because it is a free, open, global standard, uniquely suited to financial data. XBRL US is a nonprofit standards developer that built XBRL data standards for public companies, mutual funds, and credit rating agencies, under contract with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. XBRL US leads the effort to build the financial portion of Orange Button standards, leveraging elements from the U.S. GAAP Taxonomy for public companies, and from existing solar data standards.
Public companies in the solar industry, such as electric utilities, investors, and solar developers, already format their financials in XBRL which will ease the path to Orange Button adoption. The value of standards increases as more companies use them. A growing number of companies and applications are adopting, implementing, and facilitating this initiative, such as Sunnova Energy Corporation and Wells Fargo, among others. In Oracle’s Enterprise Performance Reporting Cloud Service, the Disclosure Management capability enables the creation of XBRL files based on the Orange Button taxonomy.
“XBRL is the ideal standard for Orange Button given the need for consistent, comparable financial information in solar financing,” said Campbell Pryde, President and CEO, XBRL US, “XBRL US, along with SunSpec, has a strong interest in the success of Orange Button, and we look forward to continuing to develop, refine and expand on the taxonomy to cover more use cases, and to continue to meet the needs of the industry as they evolve.”
Orange Button standards represent the life cycle phases of solar financing, including feasibility, design, construction, finance and operations. Content available during the public review includes the digital dictionary of data fields and definitions, which can be easily viewed, and commented on, through a review tool called Yeti, contributed to the Orange Button program by CoreFiling, a global supplier of XBRL-enabled financial reporting software.
To access the public review, go to: https://xbrl.us/events/sunspec-201710113/
About the SunShot Initiative
The U.S. Department of Energy SunShot Initiative is a national effort to drive down the cost of solar electricity and support solar adoption. SunShot aims to make solar energy a low-cost electricity source for all Americans through research and development efforts in collaboration with public and private partners. Learn more at energy.gov/sunshot.
About the SunSpec Alliance
The SunSpec Alliance is a trade alliance of developers, manufacturers, researchers and service providers, together pursuing information and communications standards for the distributed energy industry. SunSpec standards address most operational aspects of PV, energy storage and other distributed energy power plants on the smart grid—including residential, commercial, and utility-scale systems—thus reducing cost, promoting innovation, and accelerating industry growth. More than 100 organizations are members of the SunSpec Alliance, including global leaders from Asia, Europe, and North America. Membership is open to corporations, non-profits, labs, governments and educational institutions. For more information about the SunSpec Alliance, or to download SunSpec specifications free of charge, please visit www.sunspec.org.
About XBRL US
XBRL US is the non-profit consortium for XBRL business reporting standards in the U.S. and represents the business information supply chain. Its mission is to support the implementation of business reporting standards through the development of taxonomies for use by U.S. public and private sectors, with a goal of interoperability between sectors, and by promoting XBRL adoption through marketplace collaboration. XBRL US has developed taxonomies for U.S. GAAP, credit rating and mutual fund reporting under contract with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, and has developed industry-specific taxonomies for corporate actions, solar financing and surety processing.
FOR MORE INFORMATION:
Tom Tansy
SunSpec Alliance
tom@sunspec.org
831-227-1073
Michelle Savage
XBRL US
michelle.savage@xbrl.us
917 747 1714
