There is no fee for any party to use the platform, but Wiser charges a monthly access fee for optional, additional tools it developed for systems integrators. Examples include financial and utility analytical reports, as well as tools that enable systems integrators to put together proposals and financing comparisons for their leads and clients. Wiser does not require a standard minimum investment but it is not a crowdsourcing platform, says Homan.

Other firms offering investments in solar projects include Oakland, Calif.-based Mosaic, which uses a crowdfunding platform, and Santa Clara, Calif.-based SCS Renewables/Mercatus.

Political Picture

For decades, regulations have permitted fossil fuel developers to create master limited partnerships, which offer favorable tax benefits and can be publicly traded. “It’s astonishing to us that renewable energy projects don’t have the same treatment,” says Homan.

The Master Limited Partnership Parity Act, re-introduced in April in the House and Senate, seeks to extend the MLP structure to clean energy resources and infrastructure projects. The office of U.S. Senator Chris Coons (D-Del.), the bill’s sponsor, did not return messages by press time.

Tim Urban, a partner and principal with Ernst & Young, has been very involved with speaking to U.S. House and Senate members and staff about the MLP Parity Act and is optimistic. He is a member of Washington Council Ernst & Young, a legislative advisory services group that helps its clients, including the SEIA and other renewable energy associations, manage risks associated with the legislative process.

Urban says the MLP legislation must clear two hurdles. First, it has to be well regarded and popular, which he believes it arguably is. “It’s the unicorn of renewable energy tax proposals because it has broad bipartisan support across the political spectrum,” Urban says.

Second, he notes, it needs to find the appropriate legislative vehicle to be attached to, such as a tax bill with an energy title or an energy bill with a tax title.

Urban doesn’t expect action on the MLP legislation until the fall, at the earliest, but he’s confident it could be passed at some point. “In this business, you never say anything is a sure thing,” he says, “but if you look at this proposal, it shares the characteristics of many popular proposals that have been enacted into law.”

In addition to having bipartisan support, he says, it affects more than a narrow group of recipients and it’s a move toward the simplification and fairness that other energy projects and investors are already receiving.