solar power

The power of the sun is on the air.

Yesterday, KGO-AM 810 NewsTalk Radio in San Fransisco became the first major broadcast media outlet in California to transmit via solar power. The switch to solar will allow KGO to reduce its impact on the power grid and make KGO, with a weekly reach of 700,000 listeners, an ambassador of solar power's viability.

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.

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:

The US Senate Republicans are trashing hopes for a booming home-grown solar energy sector. Oh, but that’s not news.

And neither is the fact that nearly all Americans – across all parties – believe that a solar energy industry is vital to the United States. Ninety-eight percent of Independents. Ninety-seven percent of Democrats. And ninety-one percent of Republicans.

The survey findings were released by the SCHOTT Solar BarometerTM yesterday and were conducted by the independent polling firm, Kelton Research.

When asked which energy source they would support if they were president, 41 percent picked solar. Three percent chose coal. Together, solar and wind together were favored nearly 20 times more than America’s dirtiest fuel.

Best nugget of all?

Dallas-based BroadStar Wind Systems is about to turn a giant corner --- into $1 per watt wind, into urban windmills and into the global energy big league.

If, that is, its new wind turbine -- the "flexi-location" AeroCam -- can live up to all of it of its enormous claims.

No small task.

The company busted out of stealth at WINDPOWER 2008 with the announcement of its long-awaited AeroCam -- and this shocker of a double promise:

Hollywood-based start-up Sunrgi claims its solar will be as cheap as coal -- and soon.

The cost: 5 cents wholesale per kilowatt-hour.

When: 12 to 15 months for commercial production.

Craig Goodman, president of the National Energy Marketers Associations, says it would be a godsend to the world:

Solar power at 5 cents per kWh would be a world-changing breakthrough. It would make solar generation of electricity as affordable as generation from coal, natural gas or other non-renewable sources, without requiring any subsidy.

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Blowing up over your water heater bill?

The UK-based engineering firm Industrial Design Consultancy (IDC) has plans to mass produce inflatable solar panels that will provide hot water at a fraction of the cost of conventional solar heaters.

Phoenix-based solar modules maker First Solar Inc. has been growing like crazy from its European clients.

In ‘07, its profits soared a mighty 686 percent. Revenue quadrupled to $200 million. And yesterday, it reported a nine-fold leap in its first-quarter returns and announced future revenues that might go north of $1 billion in ‘08.

And now it’s poised to enter the US utility market.

In the wake of the global investment surge in solar power, China is cashing in -- big time. And its clean energy progress is putting the US and others to shame.

China has now overtaken Germany as the world’s #1 producer of solar cells, according to numbers tallied by the German magazine Der Spiegel.

Last year, China reached a production capacity of 1,200 megawatts, while runner-up Germany – one of the industry’s pioneers and long-time leaders – produced 875 megawatts worth of solar cells.

One-year wonder? No.