LevelTen Energy’s Q3 2025 North America PPA Price Index Report is now available for subscribers. Highlights of this quarter’s report include:
Solar Prices Shifting Upward
In Q3 2025, LevelTen Energy's Market-Averaged Continental Index saw P25 solar PPA prices increase by 4% quarter over quarter. These rising prices are unsurprising given the broader policy headwinds the US solar sector is navigating.
Following the July 4 signing of President Trump's One Big Beautiful Bill Act (or "OBBBA") and subsequent Treasury guidance on tax credit qualification in August, US developers have been racing to begin construction on as many projects as possible before July 4, 2026. Developers are working hard to safe harbor as many projects as possible — helping bolster tax-credit-eligible project supply for buyers. But as potent of an impact as tax credit clawbacks pose to PPA pricing, the most prominent driver of Q3's PPA price increases came from elsewhere: a range of tariffs that have taken effect on steel, aluminum, copper, and more — pushing up prices for solar developers, and the EPC firms they partner with.
Wind Prices Post Material Rise
P25 wind prices on LevelTen's Market-Averaged Continental Index rose by nearly 5% in Q3, and have risen by 14% year over year. Recent months have seen major shifts in federal-level wind review processes, with an array of new obstacles emerging for project approvals coming from several federal entities. The Interior Department has also been undertaking more extensive reviews of wind projects sited on public lands, or private land that requires federal review — even revoking approvals for projects that had been green-lit under the previous administration.
On top of these new obstacles, Section 232 tariffs are adding to already rising development costs, with an ongoing investigation into critical minerals bringing the potential to add even further levies. All in, prices are going up, and wind developers are needing prospective buyers to be open to risk-sharing in order to get deals across the finish line.
Tariffs, AD/CVD, FEOC All in Play
President Trump's One Big Beautiful Bill Act has spurred major shifts in US clean energy development. But while the new law has (understandably) directed much attention to tax credit impacts, other risks and challenges have been driving pricing trends in the immediate term.
Tariffs on metals, minerals, and essential project components, layered on top of country-specific tariffs, are applying broad upward pressure to development costs. What's more, a new Commerce Department Anti-Dumping/Countervailing Duties (AD/CVD) investigation into solar component manufacturers in Laos, India, and Indonesia is poised to add additional levies on new reaches of the global PV upstream. And pending Foreign Entity of Concern (FEOC) rules stand to add even more to compliance costs for developers. These trade-law moves are bringing very real cost increases to building wind and solar projects in the US. Increasingly, PPA counterparties are employing price adjusters and indexation in their contracts to allow for the re-opening of PPA price after contract signing, allowing prices to flex up or down within agreed-upon ranges should certain events come to pass.
Haste Is the Name of the Game
Developers are working fast to safe harbor as many projects as they can, helping to bolster the future supply of tax-credit-eligible projects for PPA buyers. But these efforts will preserve only a finite amount of planned capacity, meaning buyers that see PPAs as part of their multi-year strategy must avoid complacency at all costs. As time progresses, risks related to pending FEOC rules will add to development costs, and of course, only a limited number of planned projects will be able to begin construction in time to secure tax credits — without which, PPA economics will move into unknown, and undoubtedly more expensive, territory.
While building wind and solar has become more challenging in this new environment, so too has developing other types of energy sources like natural gas and nuclear — which are also subject to tariffs, labor shortages, supply chain constraints, and more. With energy demand surging regardless of these buildout constraints, buyers serious about securing fixed-price clean power are strongly advised to launch procurements today.
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