solar energy

The Berkeley City Council unanimously approved a measure on Tuesday night to fund a program providing loans to property owners for the installation of rooftop solar-power systems. The program is the first of its kind in the nation, which creates a new sustainable energy tax district (pdf) within the city.

Property owners who opt into the program will be given loans for solar systems and pay no up front costs. At an average cost $22,000 apiece (after a $6,108 rebate from the state-run California Solar Initiative), the systems will be paid for over a 20-year term. Homeowners pay off the loan as part of the property tax bill. The cost of the loan will run around $180 per month at an annual rate of 6.75%.

The innovative idea behind this city-run financial mechanism is that homeowners would pay for solar energy via an opt-in property tax increase that would be offset by annual savings on their electric bills.

Nanosolar stole headlines in December when it shipped its first commercial batch of thin-film solar cells to a German power plant, accompanied by this future price claim: solar panels for $1 a watt.

They've sold like candy ever since. So what now?

A massive funding boost. Nanosolar has announced it has raised $300 million in equity financing to meet exploding demand, pushing its capital to a half a billion dollars.

That’s the largest fundraising for a solar startup in 2008. And it positions the six-year-old San Jose upstart as a technology leader in the race to knock King Coal off its cheap-energy throne.

The brass ring for solar energy has long been "grid parity," or delivering electricity to the grid at the prevailing local price. But the solar photovoltaic (PV) march toward parity has been delayed, ironically, by the sector's own surging popularity.

The main reason? Supply of the raw material, crystalline silicon, hasn't kept up with skyrocketing PV demand, resulting in severe shortages and high prices. But with new factories and new technology on the horizon, the supply shortage may end soon, which means the prices could drop like a rock. Or maybe not.

Confused? Read on...

As the Department of Interior's Bureau of Land Management (BLM) lifts its absurd moratorium on new solar projects on public lands -- a result of industry and public outcry -- it’s worth remembering that five years ago the BLM was campaigning for solar.

Yep. The BLM released a report in February 2003, arguing for heavy development of solar power and other renewables on public lands in the West. Straight from the agency's 2003 release:

Increasing our domestic development of renewable energy sources, will help to reduce our dependency on foreign sources of energy...As the report demonstrates, public lands have abundant opportunities for renewable energy development.

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Here’s the latest on America’s solar energy potential from a well-reasoned new report by Clean Edge and Co-op America:

Solar could become ubiquitous as with earlier semiconductor-based revolutions.

Right now, solar makes up just one-tenth of one percent of the US total energy supply. But that could jump to ten percent by 2025 with a total investment of about $30 billion a year and a sharp turn in thinking from the nation’s utilities, according to the new roadmap to a solar future, Utility Solar Assessment (USA) Study (pdf).

It’s practical counsel when you consider that the utility industry spent $70 billion last year on traditional power plants and distribution. From the study:

It’s good times for the clean energy technology sector. Expect them to get better -- especially if high fossil fuel prices stick.

That’s the conclusion of a new report by PricewaterhouseCoopers, aptly titled: Cleantech Comes of Age.

The rundown: In 2007, venture capitalists poured $2.2 billion into cleantech start-ups -- a 45 percent jump from '06 and far more than expected.

Solar stole the show.

"Big Solar" may take on a whole new meaning if Desertec, the most ambitious solar thermal plan ever conceived, gets funded.

Its architects claim they can build a supergrid of concentrating solar thermal plants (CSP) that can meet most of Europe's current electricity needs by using just 0.3 percent of the deserts of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) – and at a cost less than oil.

The long-term prospects look even sunnier.

After seven years of dead-end negotiations, Israel will soon turn 1,000 acres in the Negev Desert into giant solar thermal stations.

The $700 million enterprise will comprise two plants to supply 250 megawatts of power in total, equal to 2.5 percent of the nation’s electricity needs.

And it’s slated for solar stardom.

Yesterday saw another encouraging sign out of the solar-electric sector.

AES Solar was born.

The new company is a joint venture of Virginia-based AES -- one of the world’s largest power companies -- and New York-based private equity firm Riverstone Holdings.

A promising story in the plight for cheap, ubiquitous solar power -- and an increasingly typical one, it should be said.