In what has to be one of the biggest pieces of solar news this year, at least from a business standpoint, First Solar announced on Thursday, Jan. 14, that it had bought all the shares of its development partner, Edison International.

The terms of the purchase have not been disclosed, but stocks for both Tempe, Arizona-based First Solar and Edison International’s Edison Mission Group (EMG), headquartered in Irvine, California, were recently trading lower; First Solar down 56 cents, and EMG down 24 cents.

The deal reportedly includes about a dozen solar farm projects the two were jointly establishing, all ranging in size between 20 megawatts and 150 megawatts, or utility-scale solar.

The deal probably should not be seen as reluctance on the part of EMG to continue the partnership, since its role was preliminary anyway; acquiring property, arranging permitting and setting up power purchase agreements (PPAs), and all but the latter have been completed on most projects in the pipeline.

First Solar’s role – design/build – was always second phase, and its acquisition of these projects, largely located on private land. eliminates the need for a lot of the environmental oversight and Bureau of Land Management quibbles that have beset larger projects on public land.

Thus far, according to analysts, the single most apparent downside for First Solar is that PPAs have not yet been arranged. The upside, in the same vein, is that these smaller, private projects could – if power purchasers are found – protect the company’s balance sheet from any of the financial risks inherent in delaying the big projects, like the 250-megawatt Desert Sunlight project near Desert Center, Calif., and the 300 megawatt Stateline project in northeastern San Bernardino County.

In addition, First Solar says that the planned expansion of its manufacturing pipeline – to 1.8 gigawatts of thin-film solar this year (via two new production plants) – will provide sufficient product for the new role. And the company, which got its sea-legs arranging permitting for small scale/residential solar arrays, is expected to easily grow into its new role as a utility-scale solar company vested across the entire spectrum of solar energy.

In fact, in spite of some analyst’s grim expectations of delays and lawsuits over First Solar’s push for utility-scale solar on public lands, First Solar has long been in the business of developing and building solar farms, only to sell them (to NRG Energy, for example) when they are close to completion.

As for power purchase agreements, increasingly demanding renewable energy mandate proposals – like Colorado’s 30 percent by 2020 (compared to the 20 percent now on the books) – make it likely First Solar will find buyers sooner rather than later, particularly in the current energy economy.

In fact, the important question might not be why First Solar bought the pipeline of projects, but why EMG sold them.